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Beasts of the Field 





Did you ever meet a fox face to face? 
(See pase 273) 




BOSTON, U.S.A., AND LONDON 

GINN & COMPANY PUBLISHERS 

THE ATHEN/^\J/A PRESS 
I90I 



THE LIBRARY OF 
CONGRESS. 

Two CoHita Received 

OCT. 10 1901 

COPVRIGHT. ENTRY 

CLASS ^XXc. No. 
COPY 8. 




Entered at Stationers' Hall 



Copyright, iSgg, 1900, 1901 
By WILLIAM J. LONG 

all rights reserved 







TEACHERS OF AMERICA 

who arc striving to make Nature 
Study more vital and attractive by 
revealing a vast realm of Nature 
outside the realm of Science, and 
a world of ideas above and beyond 
the world of facts, these studies 
from Nature are dedicated 





PREFACE S2| 

r^INCE the publication of ''Way. 
^^ Wood Folk " and " Wilderness Ways, 
and the more recent ''Secrets of the Woods,^^ 
many requests have come to Publishers and 
Author for better a7id more fully illustrated 
editions of these studies of life in the woods 
and fields ; and these requests grow fnore 
and more num^erous as successive editions 
are printed. 

It is chiefly iit answer to this demand that 
these two volumes, "Beasts of the Field'' and 
"Fowls of the Air,'' have been prepared. 
They include most of the previotcs sketches, 
with enough new m^aterial to give variety 



VI 11 



/ 



and a wider range of acqiiaintance with 
the Wood Folk. 

The names used here for birds a^td beasts 
were given by the Milicete Indians; the 
occasional lege^ids referred to have never been 
written^ but were heard by the writer before 
the camp-fire, in the heart of the wilderness ; 
and the incidents a7id sketches are true to life, 
as I have seen it in niany years of watching 
and following the wild tlmigs. 

WM, J. LONG. 
Stamford, Conn., 
August, 1 90 1. 




Meeko the Mischief-maker 

Megaleep the Wanderer . 

Br'er Rabbit . 

Keeonekh the Fisherman 

MoowEEN the Bear 

A Wilderness Byway . 

Kagax the Bloodthirsty 

Moose Calling 

The Builders 

Upweekis the Shadow 

Fox -Ways 

TOOKHEES the 'FrAID OnE 

Glossary of Indian Names 



Page 

I 

41 

73 

93 

125 

151 
161 

185 
205 

237 
271 

303 
331 




FULL-PAGE e^m'M 

ILLUSTRATIONS ''^ 

Did you ever meet a Fox face to face? . . Froiitispiece 

Facing Page 

Hurling Threats and Vituperation ahead of him . i8 ^ 
The Leading Bulls gave a few Mighty Bounds . . 46 "' 

The Woods seemed full of Rabbits 86 "^ 

With Back humped against the Ice above him, 

eating his Catch no ' 

A Huge Head and Shoulders were thrust out of 

THE Bushes 136 ' 

Two Sets of Strong Curved Claws dropped down 

FROM the Shadow 182 "-^ 

Possibly a Man might mistake me for a Moose . . 194 ' 

An Enormous Amount of Work 214 u^ 

The Stripped Carcass of a Caribou with two Lynxes 

still upon it 254 '-^ 

He only looks you over indifferently 294 ^ 

There was Tookhees sitting on the Rim of my 

Drinking Cup 310 '' 

xi 







/ 




AEEK 

THE 

AISCHIEF- 

yV^E!V' 



AEEKO 



THE 



\%mtp^t\miR 




HERE IS a curious Indian 
legend about Meeko the red 
squirrel — the Mischief-Maker, 
as the Milicetes call him — 
which is also an excellent commentary upon 
his character. Simmo told it to me one day 
when we had caught Meeko coming out of 
a woodpecker's hole with the last of a brood 
of fledgelings in his mouth, chuckling to 
himself over his hunting. 

Long ago, in the days when Clote Scarpe 
ruled the animals, Meeko was much larger 
than he is now, large as Mooween the bear. 
But his temper was so fierce and his dispo- 
sition so altogether bad that the wood folk 
were threatened with destruction. Meeko 

3 



killed right and left with the temper of a 

weasel, who kills from pure lust of blood. 

<^^^ l^eeko So Clote Scarpe, to save the little woods- 

'-n^f^^. /- ^^ people, made Meeko smaller — small as he 

^ ^ is now. Unfortunately, Clote Scarpe forgot 

Meeko's disposition, which remained as big 

and as bad as before. So now Meeko goes 

about the woods with a small body and a 

great temper, barking, scolding, quarreling 

and, since he cannot destroy in his rage as 

before, setting other animals by the ears to 

* destroy each other. 

When you have listened to Meeko's scold- 
ing for a season, and have seen him going 
from nest to nest after innocent fledgelings ; 
or creeping into the den of his big cousin, 
the beautiful gray squirrel, to kill the young ; 
or driving away his little cousin, the chip- 
munk, to steal his hoarded nuts ; or watching 
every fight that goes on in the woods, jeer- 
ing and chuckling above it, — then you begin 
to understand the Indian legend. 

Spite of his doubtful ways, however, he is 
interesting and always unexpected. When 
you have watched the red squirrel that lives 



near your camp all summer, feeding from 
your hand and sharing your life until you 
think you know all about him, he does the 
queerest thing, good or bad, to upset all 
your theories and cast the shadow of doubt 
upon the Indian legends about him. 

I remember one squirrel that greeted me, 
the first living thing in the great woods, as 
I ran my canoe ashore on a wilderness river. 
Meeko heard me coming. His bark sounded 
loudly in a big spruce above the dip of the 
paddles. As we turned shoreward, he ran 
down the tree in which he was, and out on a 
fallen log to meet us. I grasped a branch of 
the old log to steady the canoe and watched 
him curiously. He had never seen a man 
before ; he barked, jeered, scolded, jerked 
his tail, whistled, did everything within his 
power to make me show my teeth and my 
disposition. 

Suddenly he grew excited — and when 
Meeko grows excited the woods are not big 
enough to hold him. He came nearer and 
nearer to my canoe, till he leaped upon the 
gunwale and sat there chattering, as if he 



5 










Vf 



were Adjidaumo come back again and I were 

Hiawatha. All the while he had poured out 

l^eeko ^ torrent of squirrel talk, but now his note 

The changed ; jeering and scolding and curiosity 

^ ^ went out 01 it ; something else crept m. I 

began to feel, somehow, that he was trying 

to make me understand something, and found 

me very stupid about it. 

I began to talk quietly, calling him a rattle- 
head and a disturber of the peace. At the 
first sound of my voice he listened with 
intense curiosity, then leaped to the log, ran 
the length of it, jumped down and began 
to dig furiously among the moss and dead 
leaves. Every moment or two he would 
stop, and jump to the log to see if I were 
watching him. 

Presently he ran to my canoe, sprang upon 
the gunwale, jumped back again, and ran 
along the log as before to where he had 
been digging. He did it again, looking 
back at me and saying plainly: " Come here, 
come and look." I stepped out of the canoe 
to the old log, whereupon Meeko went off 
into a fit of terrible excitement. — I was 



bigger than he expected ; I had only two 
legs; kut-e-k' chuck, kut-e-k' chuck ! whit, whit, 
whit, kut-e-k' chuck ! Tfeeikp d|A 

I stood where I was until he got over his ^f, . J^^ ^ 
excitement, i hen he came towards me, and ^ ^ 

led me along the log, with much chuckling 
and jabbering, to the hole in the leaves where 
he had been digging. When I bent over it 
he sprang to a spruce trunk, on a level with 
my head, fairly bursting with excitement, 
but watching me with intensest interest. In 
the hole I found a small lizard, one of the 
rare kind that lives under logs and loves 
the dusk. He had been bitten through the 
back and disabled. He could still use legs, 
tail, and head feebly, but could not run away. 
When I picked him up and held him in my 
hand, Meeko came closer with loud-voiced 
curiosity, longing to leap to my hand and 
claim his own, but held back by fear. — 
"What is \\.} He's mine; I found him. 
What is it?" he barked, jumping about as 
if bewitched. Two curiosities, the lizard 
and the man, were almost too much for 
him. I never saw a squirrel more excited. 



TfeeTco 
The 
Tfjschief^mdk^r 




!f''*|!f& 




He had evidently found the lizard by acci- 
dent, bit him to keep him still, and then, 
astonished by the rare find, hid him away 
where he could dig him out and watch him 
at leisure. 

I put the lizard back into the hole and cov- 
ered him with leaves ; then went to unload- 
ing my canoe. Meeko watched me closely. 
The moment I w^as gone he dug away the 
leaves, took his treasure out, watched it with 
wide bright eyes, bit it once more to keep 
it still, and covered it up again carefully. 
Then he came chuckling along to where I 
was putting up my tent. 

In a week he owned the camp, coming 
and going at his own will, stealing my 
provisions when I forgot to feed him, and 
scolding me roundly at every irregular 
occurrence. He was an early riser and 
insisted on my conforming to the custom. 
Every morning at daylight, he would leap 
from a fi.r tip to my ridge-pole, and sit 
there, barking and w4iistling, until I put 
my head out of my door, or until Simmo 
came along with his axe. 



Of Simmo and his axe Meeko had a mortal 

9 
dread, which I could not understand till one 

day when I paddled silently back to camp yieeHp ^^ 
and, instead of coming up the path, sat idly ^^ ^ . r^^y 
m my canoe watchmg the Indian, who had ^ ^ 

broken his one pipe and now sat making 
another out of a chunk of black alder and a 
length of nanny bush. Simmo was as inter- 
esting to watch, in his way, as any of the 
wood folk. 

Presently Meeko came down, chattering 
his curiosity at seeing the Indian so still 
and so occupied. A red squirrel is always 
unhappy unless he knows all about every- 
thing. He watched from the nearest tree 
for a while, but could not make up his mind 
what was going on. • Then he came down to 
the ground and advanced a foot at a time, 
jumping up continually but coming down 
in the same spot, barking to make Simmo 
turn his head and show his hand. Simmo 
watched out of the corner of his eye until 
Meeko was near a solitary tree which stood 
in the middle of the camp ground, when 
he jumped up suddenly and rushed at the 



lO 



squirrel, who sprang to the tree and ran 
to a branch out of reach, snickering and 
ygJ^ TVeeTco jeering. 

^'?". ^^ Simmo took his axe deliberately and swung 
^ ^ it mightily at the foot of the tree, as if to 
chop it down ; only he hit the trunk with 
the head, not the blade of his weapon. At 
the first blow, which made his toes tingle, 
Meeko stopped jeering and ran higher. 
Simmo swung again and Meeko went up 
another notch. So it went on, Simmo look- 
ing up intently to see the effect and Meeko 
running higher after each blow, until the 
tip-top was reached. Then Simmo gave a 
mighty whack; the squirrel leaped far out 
and came to the ground, sixty feet below ; 
picked himself up, none the worse for his 
leap, and rushed scolding away to his nest. 
Then Simmo said umpfh ! like a bear, and 
went back to his pipe-making. He had not 
smiled nor relaxed the intent expression of 
his face during the whole little comedy. 

I found out afterwards that making Meeko 
jump from a tree-top is one of the few diver- 
sions of Indian children. I tried it myself 



many times with many squirrels, and found 
to my astonishment that a jump from any 
height, however great, is no concern to a yieehp ^^ 
squirrel, red or gray. They have a way of ^^ ^ . r^^y 
flattening the whole body and tail against the ^ ^ 

air, which breaks their fall. Their bodies, and 
especially their bushy tails, have a curious 
tremulous motion, like the quiver of wings, 
as they come down. The flying squirrel's 
sailing down from a tree-top to another tree, 
fifty feet away, is but an exaggeration, due 
to the membrane connecting the fore and 
hind legs, of what all squirrels practice 
continually. I have seen a red squirrel 
land lightly after jumping from an enor- 
mous height, and run away as if nothing 
unusual had happened. But though I have 
watched them often, I have never seen a 
squirrel do this except when compelled to do 
so. When chased by a weasel or a marten, 
or when the axe beats against the trunk 
below — either because the vibration hurts 
their feet, or else they fear the tree is being 
cut down — they use the strange gift to save 
their lives. But I fancy it is a breathless 



12 



^W: The 

TfJschief^mGh^r 



experience, and they never try it for fun ; 
though I have seen them do all sorts of risky 
l^eeko stumps in leaping from branch to branch. 




It would be interesting to know whether 
the raccoon also, a large, heavy animal, has 
the same way of breaking his fall when he 
jumps from a height. One bright moon- 
light night, when I ran ahead of the dogs, 
I saw a big coon leap from a tree to the 
ground, a distance of some thirty or forty 
feet. The dogs had treed him in an ever- 
green, and he left them howling below while 
he stole silently from branch to branch until 
a good distance away, when, to save time, he 
leaped to the ground. He struck with a 
heavy thump, but ran on uninjured as 
swiftly as before, and gave the dogs a long 
run before they treed him again. 

The sole of a coon's foot is so padded with 
fat and gristle that it touches the ground like 
a coiled spring. This helps him greatly in 
his dizzy jumps; but I suspect that he also 
knows the squirrel trick of flattening his body 
and tail against the air so as to fall lightly. 



The chipmunk seems to be the only one 
of the squirrel family in whom this gift is 
wanting. Possibly he has it also, if the need TVeeT^o ^^ 
ever comes. I fancy, however, that he would ^? ^ . ,^^^ 
fare badly if compelled to jump from a ^ ^ 

spruce top, for his body is heavy and his 
tail small from long living on the ground ; • 
all of which seems to indicate that the tree- 
squirrel's bushy tail is given him, not for 
ornament, but to aid his passage from branch 
to branch, and to break his fall when he 
comes down from a height. 

By way of contrast with Meeko, you may 
try a curious trick on the chipmunk. It is 
not easy to get him into a tree ; he prefers 
a log or an old wall when frightened ; and 
he is seldom more than two or three jumps 
from his den. But watch him. as he goes 
from his garner to the grove where the 
acorns are, or to the field where his winter ' 
corn is ripening. Put yourself near his path 
(he always follows the same one to and fro) 
where there is no refuge close at hand. 
Then, as he comes along, rush at him sud- 
denly and he will take to the nearest tree in 



14 



his alarm. When he recovers from his 
fright — which is soon over; for he is the 
^jjw 7!fee^^ most trustful of squirrels and looks down at 
1^?". ^^ you wath interest, never questioning your 
^ ^ motives — take a stick and begin to tap the 
tree softly. The more slow and rhythmical 
your tattoo the sooner he is charmed. Pres- 
ently he comes down closer and closer, his 
eyes filled with strange wonder. More than 
once I have had a chipmunk come to my 
hand and rest upon it, looking everywhere 
for the queer sound that brought him down, 
forgetting fright and cornfield and coming 
winter in his bright curiosity. 







v5) 



Meeko is a bird of another color. He 
never trusts you nor anybody else fully, and 
his curiosity is generally of the vulgar, selfish 
kind. When the autumn woods are busy 
places, and wings flutter and little feet go 
pattering everywhere after winter supplies, 



15 



he also begins garnering, remembering the 
hungry days of last winter. But he is 
always more curious to see what others yjeeko ^A 
are doing than to fill his own bins. He ^<? . /^y 
seldom trusts to one storehouse — he is too ^ ^ 

suspicious for that — but hides his things in 
twenty different places ; some shagbarks in 
the old wall, a handful of acorns in a hollow 
tree, an ear of corn under the eaves of the 
old barn, a pint of chestnuts scattered about 
in the trees, some in crevices in the bark, 
some in a pine crotch covered carefully with 
needlas, and one or two stuck firmly into the 
splinters of every broken branch that is not 
too conspicuous. But he never gathers 
much at a time. The moment he sees any- 
body else gathering he forgets his own work 
and goes spying to see where others are 
hiding their store. The little chipmunk, 
who knows his thieving and his devices, 
always makes one turn, at least, in the tunnel 
to his den too small for Meeko to follow. 

He sees a blue jay flitting through the 
woods, and knows bv his unusual silence 
that he is hiding things. Meeko follows 



after him, stopping all his jabber and stealing 

from tree to tree, watching, for hours if need 

^fmg*^ TYeeTco b^' ^^^il he knows that Deedeeaskh is gath- 

^^^ '^e ering corn from a certain field. Then he 

^ ^ watches the line of flight, like a bee hunter, 

and sees Deedeeaskh disappear twice by an 

oak on the wood's edge. Meeko rushes away 

at a headlong pace and hides himself in the 

oak. There he traces the jay's line of flight 

a little farther into the woods ; sees the 

unconscious thief disappear by an old pine. 

Meeko hides in the pine, and so traces the 

jay straight to one of his storehouses. 

Sometimes Meeko is so elated over the 
discovery that, with all the fields laden with 
food, he cannot wait for winter. When the 
jay goes away Meeko falls to eating or to 
carrying away his store. More often he 
marks the spot and goes away silently. 
When he is hungry he will carry off Deedee- 
askh's corn before touching his own. 

Once I saw the tables turned in a most 
interesting fashion. Deedeeaskh is as big a 
thief in his way as is Meeko, and also as vile 
a nest-robber. The red squirrel had found a 



hoard of chestnuts — small fruit, but sweet 

17 
and good — and was hiding it away. Part 

of it he stored in a hollow under the stub yjeeko ^A 

of a broken branch, twenty feet from the ^^, . J^^ ^ 

, ^, r 1 ^1 ^ nischief^moker 

ground, so near the source of supply that ^ ^ 

no one would ever think of looking for it 
there. While he was gone back to his 
chestnut tree, and I watched for his return, 
a blue jay came stealing into the tree, spy- 
ing and sneaking about as if a nest of 
fresh thrush's eggs were somewhere near. 
He smelled a mouse evidently, for after a 
moment's spying he hid himself away in the 
tree-top, close up against the trunk. Pres- 
ently Meeko came back, with his face bulging 
as if he had toothache, uncovered his store, 
emptied in the half-dozen chestnuts from his 
cheek pockets and covered them all up again. 
The moment he was gone the blue jay 
went straight to the spot, seized a mouthful 
of nuts, and flew swiftly away. He made 
three trips before the squirrel came back. 
Meeko in his hurry never noticed the loss, 
but emptied his pockets and was off to the 
chestnut tree again. When he returned, the 



^ jay in his eagerness had disturbed the leaves 
which covered the hidden store. Meeko 

^njjf^ TVeeTio noticed it and was all suspicion in an instant. 

^!?". ^^ He whipped off the covering and stood star- 
"^ ^ ing down intently into the garner, evidently 
trying to compute the number he had brought 
and the number that were there. Then a 
terrible scolding began, a scolding that was 
broken short off when a distant screaming 
of jays came floating through the woods. 
Meeko covered his store hurriedly, ran along 
a limb and leaped to the next tree, where he 
hid in a knot hole, just his eyes visible, watch- 
ing his garner keenly out of the darkness. 

Meeko has no patience. Three or four 
times he showed himself nervously. For- 
tunately for me, the jay had found some 
excitement to keep his rattle-brain busy for 
a moment. A flash of blue, and he came 
stealing back, just as Meeko had settled 
himself for more watching. After much 
peeking and listening the jay flew down to 
the storehouse, and Meeko, unable to con- 
tain himself a moment longer at sight of 
the thief, jumped out of his hiding and came 




Hurling threats and vituperation ahead of him 



rushing along the Hmb, hurling threats and 

vituperation ahead of him. The jay fluttered 

off, screaming derision. Meeko followed, yjeeko ^k A 

hurling more abuse, but soon gave up the ^^. . r^^ ^ 

chase and came back to his chestnuts. It J \ 

was curious to watch him there, sitting 

motionless and intent, his noae close down 

to his treasure, trying to compute his loss. 

Then he stuffed his cheeks full and began 

carrying his hoard off to another hiding 

place. 

The autumn woods are full of such little 
comedies. Jays, crows, and squirrels are all 
hiding away winter's supplies, and no matter 
how great the abundance, not one of them 
can resist the temptation to steal or to break 
into another's orarner. 

o 

Meeko is a poor provider; he would much 
rather live on buds and bark and apple seeds 
and fir cones, and what he can steal from 
others in the winter, than bother himself 
with laying up supplies of his own. When 
the spring comes he goes a-hunting and is 
for a season the most villainous of nest- 
robbers. Every bird in the woods then 



hates him, takes a jab at him, and cries thief! 
thief! wherever he goes. 

^IHp l^eeko 

^^J^W' £ ^^ C)n a trout brook, once, I had a curious 
^ ^ sense of comradeship with Meeko. It was 
in the early spring, when all the wild things 
make holiday, and man goes a-fishing. Near 
the brook a red squirrel had tapped a maple 
tree with his teeth and was tasting the sweet 
sap as it came up scantily. Seeing him and 
remembering my own boyhood, I cut a little 
hollow into the bark of a black birch tree 
and, when it brimmed full, drank the sap 
with immense satisfaction. Meeko stopped 
his own drinking to watch, then to scold and 
denounce me roundly. 

While my cup was filling again I went 
down to the brook and took a wary old trout 
from his den under the end of a log, where 
the foam bubbles were dancing merrily. 
When I went back, thirsting for another 
sweet draught from the same spring, Meeko 
had emptied it to the last drop, and had 
his nose down in the bottom of my cup 
catching the sap as it welled up with an 



21 



l^isch/e/^mah^r 



abundance that must have surprised him. 

When I went away quietly he followed me 

through the wood to the pool at the edge yjeekp ^wA 

of the meadow, to see what I would do ^^, ^ . ^^^^^ 

next. 

Wherever you go in the wilderness you 
find Meeko ahead of you, and all the best 
camping grounds preempted by him. Even 
on the islands he seems to own the prettiest 
spots, and disputes mightily your right to stay 
there ; though he is generally glad enough 
of your company to share his loneliness, and 
shows it plainly. 



«5l 






Once I found him living all by himself on 
an island in the middle of a wilderness lake, 
with no company whatever except a family 
of mink, who are his enemies. He had prob- 
ably crossed on the ice in the late spring, 
and while he was busy here and there with 
his explorations the ice broke up, cutting off 
his retreat to the mainland, which was too 



*^- 



>«f 



far away for his swimming. So he was a 
prisoner for the long summer, and welcomed 
l^eeko "^^ gladly to share his exile. He was the 
^^ only red squirrel I ever met that never 
^ ^ scolded me roundly at least once a day. 
His loneliness had made him quite tame. 
Most of the time he lived within sight of my 
tent door. Not even Simmo's axe, though 
it made him jump twice from the top of a 
spruce, could keep him long away. He had 
twenty ways of getting up an excitement, 
and whenever he barked out in the woods I 
knew that it was simply to call me to see his 
discovery — a new nest, a loon that swam up 
close, a thieving muskrat, a hawk that rested 
on a dead stub, the mink family eating my 
fish heads, — and when I stole out to see 
what it was, he would run ahead, barking 
and chuckling at having some one to share 
his interests with him. 

In such places squirrels use the ice for 
occasional journeys to the mainland. Some- 
times also, when the waters are calm, they 
swim over. Hunters have told me that 
when the breeze is fair they make use of a 



floating bit of wood, sitting up straight with 

tail curled over their backs, making a sail of 

their bodies — just as an Indian, with no yteeHp ^kA 

knowleds^e of sailing: whatever, puts a spruce Ul^. ^ . 7^^ ^ 

bush m a bow oi his canoe and lets the wind ^ ^ 

do his work for him. 

That would be the sight of a lifetime, to 
see Meeko sailing his boat; but I have no 
doubt whatever that it is true. The only 
red squirrel that I ever saw in the water fell 
in by accident. He swam rapidly to a float- 
ing board, shook himself, sat up with his tail 
raised along his back, and began to dry him- 
self. After a little he saw that the slight 
breeze was setting him farther from shore. 
He began to chatter excitedly, and changed 
his position two or three times, evidently 
trying to catch the wind right. Finding 
that it was of no use, he plunged in again 
and swam easily to land. 

That he lives and thrives in the wilder- 
ness, spite of enemies and hunger and winter 
cold, is a tribute to his wits. He never 
hibernates, except in severe storms, when for 
a few days he lies close in his den. Hawks 



24 



and owls and weasels and martens hunt him 
continually ; yet he more than holds his own 
l^eeko i^ th^ big woods, which would lose some of 
'yj/' T. • / -T^^ their charm if their vast silences were not 
^ ^ sometimes broken by his petty scoldings. 
As with most wild creatures, the squirrels 
that live in touch with civilization are much 
keener witted than their wilderness brethren. 
The most interesting one I ever knew lived 
in the trees just outside my dormitory win- 
dow, in a New England college town. He 
was the patriarch of a large family, and the 
greatest thief and rascal among them. I 
speak of the family, but, so far as I could 
r ] see, there was very little family life. Each 
one shifted for himself the moment he was 
big enough, and stole from all the others^ 
indiscriminately. 

It was while watching these squirrels that 
I discovered first that they have regular 
paths among the trees, as well defined as our 
own highways. Not only has each squirrel 
his own private paths and ways, but all the 
squirrels follow certain courses along the 
branches in going from one tree to another. 




25 



Even the strange squirrels, which ventured 
at times into the grove, followed these high- 
ways as if they had been used to them all TVeeT^o ^ A 
their lives. ^Ij^, . r^ ^ 

On a recent visit to the old dormitory I J \ 

watched the squirrels for a while, and found 
that they used exactly the same paths, — up 
the trunk of a big oak to a certain boss, 
along a branch to a certain crook, a jump to 
a linden twig and so on, making use of one 
of the highways that I had watched them 
following ten years before. Yet this course 
was not the shortest between tw^o points, 
and there were a hundred other branches 
that they might have used. 

I had the good fortune, one morning, to see 
Meeko the patriarch make a new path for 
himself that none of the others ever followed. 
He had a home den over a hallway, and a 
hiding place for acorns in a hollow linden. 
Between the two was a driveway ; but though 
the branches arched over it from either side, 
the jump was too great for him to take. He 
would rush out as if determined to try it, 
time after time, but always his courage failed 



26 



Tf/schief^mah^r 



him ; he had to go down the oak trunk and 
cross the driveway on the ground, where 
l^eeko numberless straying dogs were always ready 
Jhe to chase him. 

One morning I saw him run twice in suc- 
cession at the jump, only to turn back. But 
the air was keen and bracing, and he felt 
its inspiration. He drew farther back, then 
came rushing along the oak branch, and 
before he had time to be afraid, hurled him- 
self across the chasm. He landed fairly on 





a maple twig, with several inches to spare, 
and hung there with claws and teeth, sway- 
ing up and down gloriously. Then, chatter- 
ing his delight at himself, he ran down the 
maple, back across the driveway, and tried 
the jump three times in succession to be 
sure he could do it. 



After that he sprang across frequently. 
But I noticed that whenever the branches 



27 



were wet with rain or sleet he never at- yjeeko ^A 

tempted it; and he never tried the return ^^ . 7^^^ 

, . 1 T TT 1111 rliscnief^maker 

jump, which was uphill, and which he ^ ^ 

seemed to know by instinct was too much 
to attempt. 

When I began feeding him, in the cold 
winter days, he showed me many curious 
bits of his life. First I put some nuts near 
the top of an old well, among the stones of 
which he used to hide things in the autumn. 
Long after he had eaten all his store, he would 
come and search the crannies among the 
stones to see if perchance he had overlooked 
any trifles. When he found a handful of 
shagbarks, one morning, his astonishment 
knew no bounds. His first thought was 
that he had forgotten them all these hun- 
gry days, and he promptly ate the biggest 
within sight of the store, a thing I never saw 
a squirrel do before. His second thought 
— I could see it in his changed attitude, 
his sudden creepings and hidings — was 
that some other squirrel had hidden them 



28 



^®f The 

Tf/schief^moh^r 




there since his last visit. Whereupon he 
carried them all off and hid them in a 
l^eeko broken linden branch. 

Then I tossed him peanuts, throwing them 
first far away, then nearer and nearer till he 
would come to my window-sill. And when 
I woke one morning he was sitting there 
looking in at the window, waiting for me to 
get up and bring his breakfast. 

In a week he had showed me all his hid- 
ing places. The most interesting of these 
was over a roofed piazza, in a building near 
by. He had gnawed a hole under the eaves, 
where it would not be noticed, and lived there 
in solitary grandeur, during stormy days, in 
a den four by eight feet, and rain proof. In 
one corner was a bushel of corn-cobs, some 
of them two or three years old, which he had 
jl stolen from a cornfield near by in the early 
autumn mornings. With characteristic im- 
providence he had fallen to eating the corn 
while yet there was plenty more to be gathered. 
In consequence he was hungry before Febru- 
ary was half over, and living by his wits, like 
his brother of the wilderness. 




The other squirrels soon noticed his jour- 
neys to my window, and presently they too 
came for their share. Spite of his fury in TVeeT^o ^Mk 

driving: them away, they manas^ed in twenty ^f, ^ . ,^^^ 

^ . , . T. . • nischief^maker 

ways to circumvent him. It was most m- ^ ^ 

teresting, while he sat on my window-sill 
eating peanuts, to see the nose and eyes of 
another squirrel peering over the crotch of 
the nearest tree, watching the proceedings 
from his hiding place. Then I would give 
Meeko five or six peanuts at once. Instantly 
the old hiding instinct would come back; 
he would start away, taking as much of his 
store as he could carry with him. The 
moment he was gone, out would come a 
squirrel from his concealment and carry off 
all the peanuts that remained. 

Meeko's wrath when he returned was most 
comical. The Indian legend is true as 
gospel to squirrel nature. If he returned 
unexpectedly and caught one of the intru- 
ders, there was always a furious chase and 
a deal of scolding and squirrel jabber 
before peace was restored and the peanuts 
eaten. 



Once, when he had hidden a dozen or 
30 

more nuts in the broken Hnden branch, a 

^jmf^ T/eeTio very small squirrel came prowling along and 

-^^?". . ^^ discovered the store. In an instant he was 

^ ^ all alertness, peekmg, listenmg, explormg, till 

quite sure that the coast was clear, when he 

rushed away headlong with a mouthful. 

He did not return that day ; but the next 

morning early I saw him do the same thing. 

An hour later Meeko appeared and, finding 

nothing on the window-sill, went to the 

hnden. Half his store of yesterday was 

gone. Curiously enough, he did not suspect 

at first that they were stolen. Meeko is 

always quite sure that nobody knows his 

secrets. He searched the tree over, w^ent 

to his other hiding places, came back,- 

counted his peanuts, then searched the 

ground beneath, thinking, no doubt, the 

wind must have blown them out — all this 

before he had tasted a peanut of those 

that remained. 

Slowly it dawned upon him that he had 

been robbed and there was an outburst of 

wrath. But instead of carrying what were 



31 

The 
Ti/sch/e/^/naT^er 



left to another place, he left them where 

they were, still without eating, and hid 

himself near by to watch. I neglected a yieehp ^A 

lecture in philosophy to see the proceed- ^I^^ - - -^^ 

ings, but nothing happened. Meeko's 

patience soon gave out, or else he grew 

hungry, for he ate two or three of his 

scanty supply of peanuts, scolding and 

threatening to himself. But he left the 

rest carefully where they were. 

Two or three times, that day I saw him 
sneaking about, keeping a sharp eye on < 
the linden; but the little thief was watch- j^ 
ing too, and kept out of the way. <^t^ 

Early next morning a great hubbub rose 
outside my window, and I jumped up to 
see what was going on. Little Thief had 
come back, and Big Thief caught him in the 
act of robbery. Away they went pell-mell, 
jabbering like a flock of blackbirds, along a 
linden branch, through two maples, across a 
driveway, and up a big elm where Little Thief —fj a \ 
whisked out of sight into a knot hole. ^^ 

After him came Big Thief, chattering ven- i- 
geance. But the knot hole was too small 



\r 



>X 





^^ 







'O 



he could not sret in. Twist and turn and 
32 ^ 

push and threaten as he would, he could not 
l^eeko g^^ i^ 5 ^^d Little Thief sat just inside jeer- 
1^ Tif^ '^^ ing maliciously. 

^ ^ Meeko gave it up after a while and went 

off, nursing his wrath. Ten feet from the 
tree a thought struck him. He rushed away 
out of sight, making a great noise, then came 
back quietly and hid under an eave where 
he could watch the knot hole. 

Presently Little Thief came out, rubbed 
his eyes, and looked all about. Through my 
glass I could see Meeko blinking and twitch- 
ing under the dark eave, trying to control his 
anger. Little Thief ventured to a branch a 
few feet away from his refuge, and Big Thief, 
unable to hold himself a moment longer,- 
rushed out^ firing a volley of direful threats 
ahead of him. In a flash Little Thief was 
back in his knot hole and the comedy began 
all over again. 

I never saw how it ended; but for a day 
or two there was an unusual amount of chas- 
ing and scolding going on outside my win- 
dows. 



It was this same big squirrel that first 
showed me a curious trick of hiding. When- 
ever he found a handful of nuts on my yieel\p ^A 
window-sill and suspected that other squirrels ^^ ^ . 7^^ ^ 
were watching to share the bounty, he had ^ ^ 

a way of hiding them all very rapidly. He 
would never carry them direct to his various 
garners; first, because these were too far h 
away, and the other squirrels would steal " 
while he was gone ; second, because, with 
hungry eyes watching somewhere, they might 
follow and find out where he habitually kept 
-things. So he used to hide them all on the 
ground, under the leaves in autumn, under 
snow in winter, and all within sight of the 
window-sill, where he could watch the store .,j 

as he hurried to and fro. Then, at his leisure, 
he would dig them up and carry them off to 
his den, two cheekfuls at a time. ' -., 

Each nut was hidden by itself; never so 
much as two in one spot. When he hid one *''y. 

under the snow he would make tracks criss- ^7 , 

cross in every direction, so that no one ^j^ 

^^ would notice the spot where he had been f^o 

\ //?digging. For a long time it puzzled me to ■ ^ ' 






jii; »''// 



=*' -fe* 








4.-" ^,. .r.^f^ 


i 


.:..'^^f 




^? ^! 





know how he remembered so many places. 

I noticed first that he would always start 

^^y^ l^eeko from a certain point, a tree or a stone, with 

^'?". ^^ his burden. When it was hidden he would 

^ ^ come back by the shortest route to the 

window-sill ; but with his new mouthful he 

would always go first to the tree or stone he 

had selected, and from there search out a 

new hiding place. 

It was many days before I noticed that, 
starting from one fixed point, he generally 
worked toward a tree or a rock in the 
distance. Then his secret was out ; he hid 
things in a line. Next day he would come 
back, start from his fixed point and move 
slowly towards the distant one till his nose 
told him he was over a peanut, which he dug 
up and ate or carried away to his den. But 
he always seemed to distrust himself ; for on 
hungry days he would go over two or three 
of his old lines in the hope of finding a 
mouthful that he had overlooked. 

This method was used only when he had 
a large supply to dispose of hurriedly, and 
not always then. Meeko is a careless fellow 



and soon forgets. When I gave him only a 
few to dispose of, he hid them helter-skelter 
among the leaves, forgetting some of them yieeJ\p ^^wA 

afterwards and enjoyins^ the rare delis^ht of ^^ _ . 7^^ ^ 

^ uv 4^1 1 1 1 • ^ liischie/^maker 

stumbling upon them when he was hungriest ^ ^ 

— much like a child whom I saw once giving 
himself a sensation. He would throw his 
penny on the ground, go round the house, 
and saunter back with his hands in his 
pockets till he saw the penny, which he 
pounced upon with almost the joy of treasure- 
trove in the highway. 

Meeko made a sad end — a fate which he 
deserved well enough, but which I had to 
pity, spite of myself. When the spring came 
on, he went back to evil ways. Sap was 
sweet and buds were luscious with the first 
swelling of tender leaves; spring rains had 
washed out plenty of acorns in the crannies 
under the big oak, and there were fresh- 
roasted peanuts still at the corner window- 
sill, within easy jump of a linden twig ; but he 
took to watching the robins to see where they 
nested, and when the young were hatched he 
came no more to my window. Twice I saw 



^ him with fledgelings in his mouth; and I 
drove him day after day from a late clutch of 
^^y^ l^eeko robin's eggs that I could watch from my study. 
^'?". ^^ He had warnings enough. Once some 
^ ^ students, who had been friendly all winter, 
stoned him out of a tree where he was nest- 
robbing; once the sparrows caught him in 
their nest under the high 
eaves, and knocked him off 
promptly. A twig upon 
which he caught in falling 
saved his life undoubtedly; 
for the sparrows were after 
him and he barely escaped 
into a knot hole, leaving the 
angry horde clamoring out- 
side. But 
T)"> .roo^.^!^:^ nothing 
d re- 
him. 





One morning, at daylight, a great crying 

of robins brought me to the window. Meeko 

was running along a limb, the first of the yiee\o ^^ 

fleds^elins^s in his mouth. After him were ^^ ^ . 7^^ ^ 
- . , . , , , , nischier^maker 

five or SIX robins, whom the parents danger ^ ^ 

cry had brought to the rescue. They were 

all excited and tremendously in earnest. 

They cried thief ! thief ! and swooped at him 

like hawks. Their cries speedily brought a 

score of other birds, some to watch, others to 

join in the punishment. 

Meeko dropped the young bird and ran 
for his den; but a robin dashed recklessly 
in his face and knocked him fair from the 
tree. That and the fall of the fledgeling 
excited the birds more than ever. This 
thieving bird-eater was not invulnerable. A 
dozen rushed at him on the ground and left 
the marks of their beaks on his coat before 
he could reach the nearest tree. 

Again he rushed for his den, but wherever 
he turned now angry wings fluttered over 
him and beaks jabbed in his face. Raging 
but frightened, he sat up to snarl wickedly. 
Like a flash a robin hurled himself down. 



^ caught the squirrel just under his ear and 
knocked him again to the ground. 
^jmjh l^eeko Things began to look dark for Meeko. 
/^. ^ ^^ The birds grew bolder and angrier every 
^ ^ minute. When he started to climb a tree 
he was hurled off twice ere he reached a 
crotch and drew himself down into it. He 
was safe there with his back against a big 
limb ; they could not get at him from behind. 
But the angry clamor in front frightened 
him, and again he started for his place of 
refuge. His footing was unsteady now and 
his head dizzy from the blows he had 
received. Before he had gone half a limb's 
length he was again on the ground, with a 
dozen birds pecking at him as they swooped 
over. 

With his last strength he snapped viciously 
at his foes and rushed to the linden. My 
window was open, and he came creeping, 
hurrying towards it on the branch over 
which he had often capered so lightly in the 
winter days. Over him clamored the birds, 
forgetting all fear of me in their hatred of 
the nest-robber. 



A dozen times he was struck on the way, 
but at every blow he clung to the branch 
with claws and teeth, then staggered on 
doggedly, making no defense. His whole 
thought now was to reach the window-sill. 

At the place where he always jumped he 
stopped and began to sway, trying to sum- 
mon strength for the effort. He knew it 
was too much, but it was his last hope. At 
the instant of his spring a robin swooped in 
his face ; another caught him a side blow 
in mid-air, and he fell heavily to the stones 
below. — Sic semper tyrannis ! yelled the 
robins, scattering wildly as I ran down 
the steps to save him, if it were not too 
late. 

He died in my hands a moment later, 
with curious maliciousness nipping my finger 
sharply at the last gasp. He was the only 



39 

yjeeko 
The 








squirrel of the lot who knew how to hide in 
a line; and never a one since his day has 

^jwJt- TVeeTto taken the jump from oak to maple over the 

^^?". , ^^ driveway. 





w. 



.C .V^-^' 



^¥ 



^j\v.' 



tofttr 

AEGALEEF 



THE .WANDERER 




% 



4t 



MEGALEEP THE WANDERER 




EGALEEP is the big 
woodland caribou of 
the northern wilder- 
ness. His Milicete 
name means The 
Wandering One, but 
it ought to mean the 
Mysterious and the Change- 
ful as well. If you hear 
that he is bold and fearless, 
that is true ; and if you are 
told that he is shy and wary 
and inapproachable, that is also true. For 
he is never the same two days in succession. 
At once shy and bold, solitary and gregarious; 
restless as a cloud, yet clinging to his feed- 
ing grounds, spite of wolves and hunters, 
till he leaves them of his own free will ; wild 
as Kakagos the raven, but inquisitive as a 

43 




44 



Wanderer 



blue jay, — he is the most fascinating and 
the least known of all the deer. 
liec^aleep 

^^ I had always heard and read of Megaleep 
as an awkward, ungainly animal, but almost 
my first glimpse of him scattered all that 
to the winds and set my nerves a-tingling in 
a way that they still remember. It was on a 
great chain of barrens in the New Brunswick 
wilderness. I was following the trail of a 
herd of caribou one day, when far ahead a 
strange clacking sound came ringing across 
the snow in the crisp winter air. I ran 
ahead to a point of woods that cut off my 
view from a five-mile barren, only to catch 
breath in astonishment and drop to cover 
behind a scrub spruce. Away up the barren 
my caribou, a big herd of them, were coming 
like an express train straight towards me. 
At first I could make out only a great cloud 
of steam, a whirl of flying snow, and here and 
there the angry shake of wide antlers or the 
gleam of a black muzzle. The loud clacking 
of their hoofs, sweeping nearer and nearer, 
gave a snap, a tingle, a wild exhilaration 



45 




to their rush which made one want to shout 
and swing his hat. Presently I could make 
out the individual animals through the Tie^aleep 
cloud of vapor that drove down the wind ^^ 
before them. They were going at a splen- -^yi 

did trot, rocking easily from side to side like 
pacing colts, — power, grace, tirelessness in 
every stride. Their heads were high, their 
muzzles up, the antlers well back on heaving 
shoulders. Jets of steam burst from their 
nostrils at every bound ; for the thermom- 
eter was twenty below zero, and the air 
snapping. A cloud of snow whirled out 
and up behind them ; through it the antlers 
waved like bare oak boughs in the wind ; 
the sound of their hoofs was like the click- 
ing of mighty castanets. — " Oh for a sledge 
and bells ! " I thought; for Santa Claus never 
had such a team. 

So they came on swiftly, magnificently, 
straight on to the cover behind which I 
crouched with nerves thrilling as at a cavalry 
charge, till I sprang to my feet with a shout 
and swung my hat ; for, as there was meat 
enough in camp, I had small wish to use 



^ my rifle, and no desire whatever to stand that 

rush at close quarters and be run down. 

Tiedaleep There was a moment of wild confusion out 

^ff , ^^ on the barren iust in front of me. The lonsr 

Wanderer - - . J ^. . -. , % 

■::^m^ swmgmg trot, that caribou never change if 

they can help it, was broken into an awk- 
ward jumping gallop. The front rank reared, 
plunged, snorted a warning, but were forced 
onward by the pressure behind. Then the 
leading bulls gave a few mighty bounds, 
which brought them close up to me, but 
left a clear space for the frightened, crowd- 
ing animals behind. The swiftest shot ahead 
to the lead ; the great herd lengthened out 
from" its compact mass ; swerved easily to 
the left, as at a word of command ; crashed 
through the fringe of evergreen in which I 
had been hiding, — out into the open with 
a wild plunge and a loud cracking of hoofs, 
where they all settled into their wonderful 
trot again and kept on steadily across the 
barren below. 

That was the sight of a lifetime. One 
who saw it could never again think of cari- 
bou as ungainly animals. 







^.*^.ll>/^OY*!>6r--\. 



^. "5|^^ 



The leading bulls gave a few mighty bounds 



Megaleep belongs to the tribe of Ishmael. 
Indeed, his Latin name, as well as his Indian 
one, signifies The Wanderer ; and if you 
watch him a little while you will understand 
perfectly why he is so called. The first time 
I ever met him in summer was at twilight, 
on a wilderness lake. I was sitting in my 
canoe by the inlet, wondering what kind of 
bait to use for a big trout which lived in an 
eddy behind the rock, and which disdained 
everything I offered him. The swallows 
were busy, skimming low and taking the 
young mosquitoes as they rose from the 
water. One dipped to the surface near 
the eddy. As he came down I saw a swift 
gleam in the depths below. He touched 
the water ; there was a swirl, a splash — and 
the swallow was gone. The trout had him. 

Then a cow caribou came out of the woods 
to a grassy point above me to drink. First 
she wandered all over the point, making it 
look afterwards as if a herd had passed. 
Then she took a sip of water by a rock, 
crossed to my side of the point and took a 
sip there ; then to the end of the point, and 



47 
XUandererW2 



r, another sip ; then back to the first place. A 
nibble of grass, and she waded far out from 
liedaleep shore to sip there ; then back, with a nod to 
^C^^ ^^ a lily pad, and a sip nearer the brook. Finally 
she meandered a long way up the shore out 
of sight, and when I picked up the paddle to 
go, she came back again. Truly a Wa7ider- 
geist of the woods, like the plover of the coast, 
who never knows what he wants, nor why 
he circles about so, nor where he is going 
next. 

If you follow the herds over the barrens 
and through the forest in winter, you find 
the same wandering, unsatisfied creature. 
And if you are a sportsman and a keen 
hunter, with well-established ways of trail- 
ing and stalking, you will be driven to des- 
peration a score of times before you get 
acquainted with Megaleep. He travels enor- 
mous distances without any known object. 
His trail is everywhere ; he is himself no- 
where. You scour the country for a week, 
crossing innumerable trails, thinking the sur- 
rounding woods must be full of caribou; 
then a man in a lumber camp, where you are 



49 



ms 

lUanderer 




overtaken by night, tells you that he saw the 
herd you are after down on the Renous bar- 
rens, thirty miles below. You go there, and Hedeleep 
have the same experience, — signs every- 
where, old signs, new signs, but never a 
caribou. And, ten to one, while you are 
there, the caribou are sniffing your snowshoe 
track suspiciously back on the barrens that 
you have just left. 

Even in feeding, when you are hot on their 
trail and steal forward, expecting to see them 
every moment, it is the same endless story. 
They dig a hole through four feet of packed 
snow to nibble the reindeer lichen that grows 
everywhere on the barrens. Before it is half 
eaten they wander off to the next barren and 
dig a larger hole; then away to the woods 
for the gray-green hanging moss that grows 
on the spruces. Here is a fallen tree half 
covered with the rich food. Megaleep nib- 
bles a bite or two, then wanders away and 
away in search of another tree like the one 
he has just left. 

And when you find him at last, the chances 
are still against you. You are stealing />' 




\ 



/■ 



forward cautiously when a fresh sign attracts 

attention. You stop to examine it a moment. 

Tledaleep Something gray, dim, misty, seems to drift 

^ fne^ |- j.g ^ cloud throus^h the trees ahead. You 
Wanderer ^ . . ^.„ . ^ 

scarcely notice it till, on your right, a stir, 

and another cloud, and another — the caribou, 
quick, a score of them ! But before your rifle 
is up and you have found the sights, the gray 
things melt into the gray woods and drift 
away ; and the stalk begins all over again. 

The reason for this restlessness is not far 
to seek. Megaleep's ancestors followed reg- 
ular migrations in spring and autumn, like 
the birds, on the unwooded plains beyond the 
Arctic Circle. Megaleep never migrates; but 
the old instinct is in him and will not let him 
rest. So he wanders through the year, and 
is never satisfied. 

Fortunately nature has been kind to Mega- 
leep, in providing him with means to gratify 
his wandering disposition. In winter, moose 
and red deer must gather into yards and stay 
there. With the first heavy storm of Decem- 
ber, they gather in small bands on the hard- 
wood ridges, and begin to make paths in the 



snow, — long, twisted, crooked paths, running 
for miles in every direction, crossing and 
recrossing in a tangle utterly hopeless to any Tieda/eep %h> W 
head save that of a deer or moose. These ^^ ]Si 

paths they keep tramped down and more "^ 

or less open all winter, so as to feed on 
the twigs and bark growing on either side. 
Were it not for this curious habit, a single 
severe winter would leave hardly a moose or 
a deer alive in the woods ; for their hoofs 
are sharp and sink deep; with six feet of 
snow on a level they can run scarcely a mile 
outside their paths without becoming hope- 
lessly stalled or exhausted. 

It is this great tangle of paths, by the way, 
which constitutes a deer or a moose yard. 

But Megaleep the Wanderer makes no 
such provision ; he depends upon Mother 
Nature to take care of him. In summer he 
is brown, like the great tree trunks among 
which he moves unseen. Then the frog of 
his foot expands and grows spongy, so that 
he can cling to the mountain-side like a goat, 
or move silently over the dead leaves. In 
winter he becomes a soft gray, the better to 



52 

l^edafeep 







/"/* ',•; 



An, 



\;$ 



m 






't if 




i^.^i\ ' 
^y^ 



fade into a snowstorm, or to stand concealed 
in plain sight on the edges of the gray, deso- 
late barrens that he loves. Then the frog of 
his foot arches up out of the way ; the edges 
of his hoof grow sharp and shell-like, so that 
he can travel over glare ice without slipping, 
and cut the crust to dig down for the moss 
upon which he feeds. The hoofs, moreover, 
are very large and deeply cleft, so as to 
spread widely when his weight is on them. 
When you first find his track in the snow, 
you rub your eyes, thinking that a huge ox 
must have passed that way. The dew-claws 
are also large, and the ankle joint so flexible 
that it lets them down upon the snow. So 
Megaleep has a kind of natural snowshoe 
with which he moves easily over the crust, 
and, except in very deep, soft snows, wanders 
at will, while other deer are prisoners in their 
yards. It is the snapping of these loose 
hoofs and ankle joints that makes the merry 
clacking sound as caribou run. 

Sometimes, however, they overestimate 
their abilities, and their wandering disposi- 
tion brings them into trouble. Once I 



found a herd of seven up to their backs in 

53 
soft snow, and tired out, — a strange condi- 
tion for caribou to be in. They were tak- Tiedaleep (y^ 
ing the affair philosophically, resting till ^^ 
they should gather strength to flounder to 
some spruce tops, where moss was plenty. 
When I approached gently on snowshoes 
(I had been hunting them diligently the 
week before; but this put a different face 
on the matter) they gave a bound or two, 
then settled deep in the snow, and turned 
their heads and said with their great soft 
eyes : " You have hunted us. Here we are, 
at your mercy." 

They were very much frightened at first ; 
then I thought they grew a bit curious, as I 
laid my rifle aside and sat down peaceably 
in the snow to watch them. One — a doe, 
more exhausted than the others, and famished 
— even nibbled a bit of moss that I pushed 
near her with a stick. I had picked it 
with gloves, so that the smell of my hand 
was not on it. After an hour or so, if I 
moved softly, they let me approach quite 
up to them without shaking their antlers or 




54 
Hedaleep 



renewing their desperate attempts to flounder 

away. But I did not touch them. That is 

a degradation which no wild creature will 

^ int> pej-mit when he is free ; and I would not 
Wanderer ^ , , c ^ - \ ^ . 

take advantage oi their helplessness. 

" Did they starve in the snow ? " you ask. 
Oh, no ! I went to the place next day and 
found that they had gained the spruce 
tops, ploughing through the snow in great 
bounds, following the track of the strongest, 
which went ahead to break the way. There 
they fed and rested, then went to some 
dense thickets where they passed the night. 
In a day or two the snow settled and hard- 
ened, and they took to their wandering 



agam. 



Later, in hunting, I crossed their tracks 
several times, and once I saw them across a 
barren; but I left them undisturbed, to fol- 
low other trails. We had eaten together; 
they had fed from my hand ; and there is no 
older truce on earth than that ; not even in 
the unchanging East, where it originated. 

Megaleep in a storm is a most curious 
creature, the nearest thing to a ghost to be 



55 



tUanderer 



found in the woods. More than other ani- 
mals he feels the falling barometer. His 
movements at such times drive you to des- Tiedaleep \l 
peration, if you are following him ; for he ^^ 
wanders unceasingly. When the storm 
breaks he has a w^ay of appearing suddenly, 
as if he were seeking you, when, by his trail, 
you thought him miles ahead. And the 
way he disappears — just melts into the 
thick driving flakes and the shrouded trees 
— is most uncanny. Eight or ten caribou 
once played hide-and-seek with me that way, 
giving me vague glimpses here and there, 
drawing near to get my scent, yet keeping 
me looking up wind into the driving snow, 
where I could see nothing distinctly. And 
all the while they drifted about like so many 
huge flakes of the storm, watching my every 
movement, seeing me perfectly. 

At such times they fear little, and even lay 
aside their usual caution. I remember trail- 
ing a large herd, one day, from early morn- 
ing, keeping near them all the time and 
jumping them half a dozen times, yet never 
getting a glimpse because of their extreme 




^ watchfulness. For some reason they were 
unwilling to leave a small chain of barrens. 
liedafeep Perhaps they knew the storm was coming, 
^ ^^ when they would be safe ; and so, instead of 
swmgmg ort mto a ten-mile straightaway trot 
at the first alarm, they kept dodging back 
and forth within a two-mile circle. At last, 
late in the afternoon, I followed the trail to the 
edge of dense evergreen thickets. Caribou 
generally rest in open woods or on the wind- 
ward edge of a barren. Eyes for the open, 
nose for the cover, is their motto. And I 
thought, " They know perfectly well I am fol- 
lowing them, and so have lain down in that 
tangle. If I go in, they will hear me ; a wood 
mouse could hardly keep quiet in such a 
place. If I go round, they will catch my scent. 
If I wait, so will they. If I jump them, the 
scrub will cover their retreat perfectly." 

As I sat down in the snow to think it 
over, a heavy rush, deep within the thicket, 
told me that something — not I, certainly — 
had again started them. Suddenly the air 
darkened, and above the excitement of the 
hunt I felt the storm coming. A storm in 



the woods is no joke when you are six miles 
from camp without axe or blanket. I broke 
away from the trail and started for the head Tiedaleep %t} 
of the second barren on the run. If I could ^^ 
make that, I was safe ; for there was a stream 
hard by, which led to camp ; and one can- 
not very well lose a stream, even in a snow- 
storm. But before I was out of the big 
timber the flakes were driving thick and soft 
in my face. Another half-mile, and one 
could not see fifty feet in any direction. 
Still I kept on, holding my course by the 
wind and my compass. Then, at the foot of 
the second barren, my snowshoes stumbled 
into great depressions in the snow, and I 
found myself on the fresh trail of my caribou 
again. " If I am lost, I will at least have a 
caribou steak, and a skin to wrap me up in," 
I said, and plunged after them. As I went, 
the old Mother Goose rhyme of nursery days 
came back and set itself to hunting music : 

Bye, baby bunting, 
Daddy 's gone a-hunting, 
For to catch a rabbit skin 
To wrap the baby bunting in. 




58 



Presently I began to sing it aloud. It 
cheered one up in the storm, and the lilt of 
liedaleep it kept time to the leaping kind of gallop, 
L-^ Tne- which is the easiest way to run on snow- 
shoes : " Bye, baby bunting ; bye, baby bunt- 
ing— Hello!" 

A dark mass loomed suddenly before me 
on the open barren. The storm lightened 
a bit, before setting in heavier; and there 
were the caribou, just in front of m_e, stand- 
ing in a compact mass, the weaker ones in 
the middle. They had no thought nor fear 
of me, apparently; they showed no sign of 
anger or uneasiness. Indeed, they barely 
moved aside as I snowshoed up, in plain 
sight, without any precaution whatever. 
And these were the same animals that had 
fled upon my approach at daylight, and that 
had escaped me all day with marvelous 
cunning. 

As with other deer, the storm is Mega- 
leep's natural protector. When it comes 



// 



V, 



y-r/ 



A he thinks that he is safe ; that nobody can 

'^x/< see him; that the falling snow will fill his 

/; tracks and kill his scent ; and that whatever 



'.'^>!^^^§k 



^f: 



/'- 



follows must speedily seek cover for itself. 

So he gives up watching, and lies down 

where he will. So far as his natural enemies Tledaleep 

are concerned, he is safe in this ; for lynx ^^ 

and wolf and panther seek shelter with a 

falling barometer. They can neither see 

nor smell ; and they are all afraid. I have 

often noticed that, among all animals and 

birds, from the least to the greatest, there is 

always a truce when the storms are out. 

But the most curious thing I ever stumbled 
into was a caribou school. That sounds 
queer; but it is more common in the wil- 
derness than one thinks. All gregarious 
animals have perfectly well-defined social 
regulations, w^hich the young must learn 
and respect. To learn them, they go to 
school in their own interesting way. 

The caribou I am speaking of now are all 
woodland caribou — larger, finer animals than 
the barren-ground caribou of the desolate 
unwooded regions farther north. In summer 
they live singly, rearing their young in deep 
forest seclusions. There each one does as 
he pleases. So when you meet a caribou in 





summer, he is a different creature, and has 

DO 

more unknown and curious ways than when 

lieda/eep he runs with the herd in midwinter. 

^ jne- I remember a soHtary old bull that lived 
Wanderer , . • • i •. 

on the mountam-side opposite my camp, one 

summer, — a most interesting mixture of fear 
and boldness, of reserve and intense curi- 
osity. After I had followed him a few times 
and he found that my purpose was wholly 
peaceable, he took tQ hunting me in the 
same way, just to find out who I was, and 
what queer thing I was doing. Sometimes 
I would see him at sunset, on a dizzy cliff 
across the lake, watching for the curl of 
smoke or the coming of a canoe. And 
when I jumped in for a swim and went 
splashing, dog-paddle way, about the island" 
where my tent was, he would walk about in 
the greatest excitement, and start a dozen 
times to come down ; but always he ran back 
for another look, as if fascinated. Again he 
would come down on a burned point near 
the deep hole where I was fishing, and, hid- 
ing his body in the underbrush, would push 
his horns up into the bare branches of a 



withered shrub, so as to make them incon- . 

6i 

spicuous, and stand watching me. As long 
as he was quiet, it was impossible to see him Tiedaleep 
there ; but I could always make him start ^^ 
nervously by flashing a looking-glass, or flop- 
ping a fish in the water, or whistling a jolly 
Irish jig. And when I tied a bright tomato 
can to a string and set it whirling round my 
head, or set my handkerchief for a flag on 
the end of my trout rod, then he could not 
stand it another minute, but came running 
dow^n to the shore, to stamp and fidget 
and stare nervously, and scare himself with 
twenty alarms while trying to make up his 
mind to swim out and satisfy his burning 
desire to know all about it. — But I am for- 
getting the caribou schools. 

Wherever there are barrens — treeless 
plains in the midst of dense forest — the 
caribou collect in small herds as winter 
comes on, following the old gregarious 
instinct. Then each one cannot do as he 
pleases any more ; and it is for this winter 
and spring life together, when laws must be 
known, and the rights of the individual be 




.•; 



, laid aside for the s^ood of the herd, that the 
62 ^ ^ 

young are trained. 

Tledaleep One afternoon in late summer I was drift- 
^7n rJ ^^^ down the Toledi River, casting for trout, 

^-'^ when a movement in the bushes ahead 

caught my attention. A great swampy tract 
of ground, covered with grass and low brush, 
spread out on either side the stream. From 
the canoe I made out two or three waving 
lines of bushes, where some animals were 
making their way through the swamp towards 
a strip of big timber, which formed a kind of 
island in the middle. 

Pushing my canoe into the grass, I made 
for a point just astern of the nearest quiver- 
ing line of bushes. A glance at a bit of soft 
ground showed me the trail of a mother 
caribou with her calf. I followed cautiously, 
the wind being in my favor. They were not 
hurrying, and I took good pains not to 
alarm them. 

When I reached the timber and crept like 
a snake through the underbrush, there were 
the caribou, five or six mother animals and 
nearly twice as many little ones, well grown. 



Wanderer 



which had evidently just come in from all 
directions. They were gathered in a natural 
opening, fairly clear of bushes, with a fallen TIedaleep 
tree or two, which served a good purpose ^^ 
later. The sunlight fell across it in great 
golden bars, making light and shadow to 
play in ; all around was the great marsh, giv- 
ing protection from enemies; dense under- 
brush screened them from prying eyes — 
and this was their schoolroom. 

The little ones were pushed out into the 
middle, away from the mothers to whom 
they clung instinctively, and were left to get 
acquainted with each other ; which they did 
very shyly at first, like so many strange chil- 
dren. It was all new^ and curious, this meet- 
ing of their kind ; for till now they had lived 
in dense solitudes, each one knowing no 
living creature save its own mother. Some 
were timid, and backed away as far as possi- 
ble into the shadow, looking with wild, wide 
eyes from one to another of the little cari- 
bou, and bolting to their mothers' sides 
at every unusual movement. Others were 
bold, and took to butting at the first 





^ encounter. But careful, kindly eyes watched 
over them. Now and then a mother caribou 
Tle^aleep would come from the shadows and push a 
^^j^^TT^ -r little one 2:ently from his retreat, under a 

bush, out mto the company. Another would 
push her way between two heads that low- 
ered at each other threateningly, and say 
with a warning shake of her head that 
butting was no good way to get along 
together. I had once thought, watching a 
herd on the barrens through my glasses, 
that they are the gentlest of animals with 
each other. Here in the little school, in the 
heart of the swamp, I found the explanation 
of things. 

For over an hour I lay there and watched, 
my curiosity growing more eager every 
moment ; for most of what I saw I could not 
comprehend, having no key, nor understand- 
ing why certain youngsters, who needed re- 
proof according to my standards, were let 
alone, and others kept moving constantly, 
and still others led aside often to be talked 
to by their mothers. But at last came a 
lesson in which all joined, and which could 



not be misunderstood, not even by a man. 
It was the jumping lesson. 

Caribou are naturally poor jumpers. 
Beside a deer, who often goes out of his way 
to jump a fallen tree just for the fun of it, 
they have no show whatever ; though they 
can travel much farther in a day and much 
easier. Their gait is a swinging trot, from 
which it is impossible to jump; and if you 
frighten them out of their trot into a gal- 
lop and keep them at it, they soon grow 
exhausted. Countless generations on the 
northern wastes, where there is no need of 
jumping, have bred this habit, and modified 
their muscles accordingly. But now a race 
of caribou has moved south into the woods, 
where great trees lie fallen across the way, 
and where, if Megaleep is in a hurry or there 
is anybody behind him, jumping is a neces- 
sity. Still he does not like it, and avoids it 
whenever possible. The little ones, left to 
themselves, would always crawl under a tree, 
or trot round it. And this is another thing 
to overcome, and another lesson to be taught 
in the caribou school. 



65 

Tie^aleep (^^ 
lUanderer 





66 

liedafeep 
Wanderer 







As I watched them, the mothers all came 
out from the shadows and began trotting 
round the opening, the little ones keeping 
close as possible each one to its mother's 
side. Then the old ones went faster; the 
calves were left in a long line stringing out 
behind. Suddenly the leader veered in to 
the edge of the timber and went over a fallen 
tree with a jump ; the cows followed splen- 
didly, rising on one side, falling gracefully 
on the other, like gray waves racing past 
the end of a jetty. But the first little one 
dropped his head obstinately at the tree and 
stopped short. The next one did the same 
thing; only he ran his head into the first 
one's legs and knocked them out from under 
him. The others whirled with a ba-a-a-ah ! 
and scampered round the tree and up to 
their mothers, who had now turned and 
stood watching anxiously to see the effect of 
their lesson. Then it began over again. 

It was true kindergarten teaching ; for, 
under guise of a frolic, the calves were being 
taught a needful lesson, — not only to jump, 
but, far more important than that, to follow a 





'2/' '^ 



leader, and to go where he goes without 
question or hesitation. For the leaders on 
the barrens are wise old bulls that make no 
mistakes. Most of the little caribou took to 
the sport very well, and presently followed 
the mothers over the low hurdles. But a 
few were timid ; and then came the most 
intensely interesting bit of the whole strange 
school, when a little one would be led to a 
tree and butted from behind till he took the 
jump. 

There was no " consent of the governed " 
in that governing. The mother knew, and 
the calf did n't, just what was good for him. 

It was this last lesson that broke up the 
school. Just in front of my hiding place a 
tree fell out into the opening. A mother 
caribou brought her calf up to this unsuspect- 
ingly, and leaped over, expecting the little one 
to follow. As she struck she whirled like 
a top and stood like a beautiful statue, her 
head pointing in my direction. Her eyes 
were bright with fear, the ears set forward, 
the nostrils spread to catch every tainted 
atom from the air. Then she turned and 



67 

Tie^aleep 
XUanderer 




^^ glided silently away, the little one close to 

her side, looking up and touching her fre- 

•^ Tieda/eep quently, as if to whisper. What is it? what 

-^TT '"'^ is it? but making^ no sound. There was no 
Wanderer . _ . ^ ^ ^ ^' ^ ^ 

signal given, no alarm oi any kind that 1 

could understand ; yet the lesson stopped 
instantly. The caribou glided away like 
shadows. Over across the opening a bush 
swayed ; here and there a leaf quivered, as 
if something touched its branch. Then the 
schoolroom was empty and the woods all 
still. 

There is another curious habit of Mega- 
leep; and this one I am utterly at a loss to 
account for. When he is old and feeble, and 
the tireless muscles will no longer carry him 
with the herd over the wind-swept barrens, 
and he falls sick at last, he goes to a spqt far 
away in the woods, where generations of his 
ancestors have preceded him, and there lays 
him down to die. It is the caribou burying 
ground ; and all the animals of a certain dis- 
trict, or a certain herd, will go there when 
sick or sore wounded, if they have strength 
enough to reach the spot. For it is far away 



from the scene of their summer homes and . 

69 

their winter wanderings. 

I know one such place, and visited it twice TIedaleep \i} 
from my summer camp. It is in a dark tama- ^^ 
rack swamp by a lonely lake, at the head of 
the Little-South- West Miramichi River, in 
New Brunswick. I found it, one summer, 
when trying to force my way from the big lake 
to a smaller one, where trout were plenty. In 
the midst of the swamp I stumbled upon a 
pair of caribou skeletons; which surprised 
me, for there were no hunters within a hun- 
dred miles, and at that time the lake had been 
for many years unvisited. I thought of fights 
between bucks, and bull moose, — how two 
bulls will sometimes lock horns in a rush, 
and are too weakened to break the lock, and 
so die together of exhaustion. Caribou are 
more peaceable ; they rarely fight that way ; 
and besides, the horns here were not locked 
together, but lying well apart. As I searched 
about, looking for the explanation of things, 
thinking of wolves, yet wondering why the 
bones were not gnawed, I found another 
skeleton, much older, then four or five more ; 





some quite fresh, others crumbhng into 
mould. Bits of old bone and some splendid 
lieda/eep antlers were scattered here and there through 
^ ^^ the underbrush ; and when I scraped away 
the dead leaves and moss, there were older 
bones and fragments mouldering beneath. 

I scarcely understood the meaning of it at 
the time; but since then I have met men, 
Indians and hunters, who have spent much 
time in the wilderness, who speak of " bone 
yards " which they have discovered, — places 
where they can go at any time and be sure 
of finding a good set of caribou antlers. And 
they say that the caribou go there to die. 

All animals, when feeble with age, or sickly, 
or wounded, have the habit of going away, 
deep into the loneliest coverts, and there lying 
down where the leaves will presently cover 
them. That is why one rarely finds a dead 
bird or animal in the woods, where thousands 
die yearly. Even your dog, that was born 
and lived by your house, often disappears 
when you thought him too feeble to walk. 
Death calls him gently; the old wolf stirs 
deep within him, and he goes away, where 



71 



me 

XUenderer 



the master he served will never find him. 

And so with your cat, which is only skin-deep 

a domestic animal ; and so with your canary, Tiedaleep 

which in death alone would be free, and beats 

his failing wings against the cage in which 

he lived so long content. But these all go 

away singly, each to his own place. The 

caribou is the only animal I know that 

remembers, when his separation comes, the 

ties which bound him to the herd, winter 

after winter, through sun and storm, in the 

forest where all was peace and plenty, on the 

lonely barrens where the gray wolf howled 

on his track; so that he turns, with his last 

strength, from the herd he is leaving to the 

greater herd which has gone before him — 

still following his leaders, remembering his 

first lesson to the end. 

Sometimes I have wondered whether this 
also were taught in the caribou school ; 
whether, once in his life, Megaleep were led 
to the spot and made to pass through it, so 
that he should feel its meaning and remem- 
ber. That is not likely; for the one thing 
which an animal cannot understand is death. 




-J7.,c.~'h^ 







And there were no signs of living caribou 

anywhere near the place that I discovered; 

liec^a/eep though down at the other end of the lake 

■^ , ^^ their tracks were everywhere. 
JDanderer ^, . . . . . , 

i here are other questions, which one can 

only ask without answering. Is this silent 

gathering merely a tribute to the old law of 

the herd; or does Megaleep, with his last 

strength, still think to cheat his old enemy, 

and go where the wolf, that followed him 

all his life, shall not find him ? How was his 

resting place first selected, and what leaders 

searched out the ground? What sound or 

sign, what murmur of wind in the pines, or 

lap of ripples on the shore, or song of the 

veery at twilight made them pause and say, 

Here is the place? How does he know, he 

whose thoughts are all of life and who never 

looked on death, where the great silent herd 

is that no caribou ever sees but once ? And 

what strange instinct guides Megaleep to the 

spot where all his wanderings end at last? 




BR'ER F?ABBIT 




73 



BR'ER RABBIT 





R'ER RABBIT is a funny fel- 
low. No wonder that Uncle 
Remus makes him the hero 
of so many adventures. Uncle 
Remus had watched him, no 
doubt, on some moonlight night when he 
gathered his boon companions together for 
a frolic. In the heart of the woods it was, 
in a little opening where the moonlight came 
streaming in through the pines, making soft 
gray shadows for hide-and-seek, and where 
no prowling fox ever dreamed of looking. 
With most of us, the acquaintance with 
Bunny is too limited for us to appreciate his 
frolicsome ways and his fun-loving disposi- 
tion. The tame things which we see about 
country yards are often stupid, like a playful 
kitten spoiled by too much handling; and 
the flying glimpse of a bundle of brown fur, 

75 




l^-^-- 



76 




scurrying helter-skelter through and over 
the huckleberry bushes, generally leaves us 
iFlaBbif staring in astonishment at the swaying 
leaves where it disappeared, and wonder- 
ing curiously what it was all about. It was 
only a brown rabbit that you almost stepped 
upon in your autumn walk through the 
woods. 

Look under the crimson sumach yonder, 
there in the bit of brown grass, with the 
purple asters hanging over, and you will find 
his form, where he has been sitting all the 
morning and where he watched you all the 
way up the hill. But you need not follow; 
you will not find him again. He never runs 
straight ; the swaying leaves there, where he 
disappeared, marked the beginning of his 
turn, whether to right or left you will never 
know. Now he has come around his circle 
and is near you again — watching you this 
minute, out of his bit of brown grass. As 
you move slowly away in the direction he 
took, peering here and there among the 
bushes, Bunny behind you sits up straight 
in his old form again, with his little paws 






11 



held very prim, his long ears pointed after 
you, and his deep brown eyes shining like 
the waters of a hidden spring among the Srfe/- 
asters. And he chuckles to himself, and 
thinks how he fooled you that time, sure. 
To see Br'er Rabbit at his best, one must 
turn hunter, and learn how to sit still and be 
patient. Only you must not hunt in the 
usual way ; not by day, for then Bunny is 
stowed away in his form, where one's eyes 
will never find him ; not with gun and dog, 
for then the keen interest and quick sym- 
pathy needed to appreciate any phase of 
animal life gives place to the coarser excite- 
ment of the hunt; and not by going about 
after Bunny, for your heavy footsteps and the 
rustle of leaves will only send him scurry- 
ing away into safer solitudes. Find where 
he loves to meet with his fellows, in quiet 
little openings in the woods. Go there by 
moonlight and, sitting still in the shadow, let 
your game find you, or pass by without 
suspicion. This is the best way to hunt, 
whether one is after game or only a better 
knowledge of the ways of bird and beast. 




bbif 





Brer 







The best spot I ever found for watching 
Bunny's ways was on the shore of a lonely 
lake in the heart of a New Brunswick forest. 
A score of rabbits (or rather hares) lived 
there who had never seen a man before, and 
were as curious about me as a blue jay. No 
dog's voice had ever wakened the echoes 
within fifty miles ; but every sound of the 
wilderness they seemed to know a thousand 
times better than I. The snapping of the 
smallest stick under the stealthy tread of 
fox or wildcat would send them scurrying 
out of sight in wild alarm ; yet I watched a 
dozen of them at play, one night, when a 
frightened moose went crashing through the 
underbrush and plunged into the lake near 
by, and they did not seem to mind it in the 
least. 

The spot referred to was the only camp- 
ing ground on the lake, — so Simmo, my 
Indian guide, assured me ; and he knew very 
well. I discovered afterward that it was the 
only cleared bit of land for miles around ; 
and this the rabbits knew very well. Right 
in the midst of their best playground I 







pitched my tent, while Simmo built his 

commoosie near by, in another little opening. 

We were tired that night, after a long day's Dr'erjT) Rabbit 

paddle in the sunshine on the river. The ^^^fW'^f^ 

after-supper chat before the camp fire was '^ ^it- ' 

short and sleepy ; and we left the lonely 

woods to the bats and owls and creeping 

things, and turned in for the night. 

I was just asleep when I was startled by 
a loud thump twice repeated, just like the 
thump a bear gives an old log with his paw, 
to see if it is hollow and contains any insects. 
I was wide awake in a moment, sitting up 
straight to listen. A few minutes passed by 
in intense stillness ; then, thump ! thu7np ! 
thump ! just outside the tent among the 
ferns. 

I crept slowly out ; but, beyond a slight 
rustle as my head appeared outside the tent, 
I heard nothing, though I waited several 
minutes and searched about among the 
underbrush. But no sooner was I back in 
the tent and quiet than there it was again, 
and repeated three or four times, now here, 
now there, within the next ten minutes. I 



*i at txaiJUi 






^ crept out again, with no better success than 
before. 
^r^er^aSblf This time, however, I would find out 
about that mysterious noise before going 
back. It is hardly pleasant to go to sleep 
until one knows what things are prowling 
about, especially things that make a noise 
like that. A new moon was shining down 
into the little clearing, giving hardly enough 
light to make out the outlines of the great 
evergreens. Down among the ferns things 
were all black and uniform. For ten minutes 
I stood there, in the shadow of a big spruce, 
and waited. Then the silence was broken 
by a sudden heavy thump in the bushes just 
behind me. I was startled, and wheeled on 
the instant; as I did so, some small animal 
scurried away into the underbrush. 

For a moment I was puzzled. Then it 
flashed upon me that I was camped upon 
the rabbits' playground. With the thought 
came a strong suspicion that Bunny was 
fooling me. 

Going back to the fire, I raked the coals 
together and threw on some fuel. Next I 



fastened a large piece of birch bark on two 
split sticks behind the fireplace ; then I sat 
down on an old log to wait. The rude 
reflector did very well as the fire burned 
up. Out in front, the fern tops were dimly 
lighted to the edge of the clearing. As I 
watched, a dark form shot suddenly above 
the ferns and dropped back, again. Three 
heavy thumps followed ; then the form shot 
up and down once more. This time there 
was no mistake. In the firelight I saw 
plainly the dangle of Br'er Rabbit's long 
legs, and the flap of his big ears, and the 
quick flash of his dark eyes in the reflected 



ight. 



I sat there nearly an hour before the why 
and the how of the little joker's actions 
became quite clear. This is what happens 
in such a case. Bunny comes down from 
the ridge for his nightly frolic in the little 
clearing. While still in the ferns, the big 
white object standing motionless in the 
middle of his playground catches his atten- 
tion ; and very much surprised, and very 
much frightened, but still very curious, he 



8i 



IBr'en 




BBi/- 




82 



crouches down close to wait and listen. But 
the strange thing does not move nor see him. 
Brer ^^^Rabbit To get a better view he leaps up high above 
^^^^^^■^kr^^ the ferns two or three times. Still the big 

^^-^^ft*^,^ thing remains quite still and harmless. 

"Now," thinks Bunny, "I'll frighten him, 
and find out what he is." Whereupon he 
strikes the ground sharply two or three times 
with his padded hind foot ; then jumps above 
the ferns quickly to see the effect of his 
scare. Once he succeeded very well, when 
he crept up close behind me, so close that 
he did not have to spring up to see the 
effect. I fancy him chuckling to himself as 
he scurried off after my sudden start. 

That was the first time that I ever heard 
Bunny's challenge. It impressed me at the 
time as one of his most curious pranks ; the 
sound was so big and h^avy for such a little 
fellow. Since then I have heard it fre- 
quently; and now, sometimes, when I stand 
at night in the forest and hear a sudden 
heavy thump in the underbrush, as if a big 
moose were striking the ground and shaking 
his antlers at me, it does not startle me in 




the least. It is only Br'er Rabbit trying to ^ 
frighten me. 

The next night Bunny played us another Br'er JT) Rabbit 
trick. Before Simmo went to sleep he 
always took off his blue overalls and put 
them under his head for a pillow. That was 
only one of Simmo's queer ways. While he 
was asleep the rabbits came into his little 
commoosie, dragged the overalls out from 
under his head, and nibbled them full of 
holes, for the taste of salt that they found in 
them. Not content with this, they played 
with them all night ; pulled them around the 
clearing, as threads here and there plainly 
showed ; then dragged them away into the 
underbrush and left them. 

Simmo's wrath when he at last found the 
precious garments was comical to behold ; 
when he wore them, with' their new polka- 
dot pattern, it was still more comical. That 
night Simmo, to avenge his overalls, set a 
deadfall supported by a piece of cord, which 
he had soaked in molasses and salt. Which 
meant that Bunny would nibble the cord, 
and bring the log down hard on his own 



84 




back. So I had to spring it, while Simmo 
slept, to save the little fellow's life and learn 
ISrerHaSbif more about him. 

On the ridge above our tent was a third 
tiny clearing, where some trappers had once 
made their winter camp. It was there that 
I watched the hares one moonlight night 
from my seat on an old log, just within the 
shadow. The first arrival came in with a 
rush. There was a sudden scurry behind 
me, and over the log he came with a flying 
leap that landed him on the smooth bit of 
ground in the middle ; where he whirled 
around and around with grotesque jumps, 
like a kitten after its tail. Only Br'er Rab- 
bit's tail was too short for him ever to catch 
it ; he seemed rather to be trying to get a 
good look at it. Then he went off like 
a rocket in a headlong rush through the 
ferns. Before I knew what had become of 
him, over the log he came again in a marvel- 
ous jump, and went tearing around the 
clearing like a circus horse, varying his 
performance now by a high leap, now by 
two or three awkward hops on his hind 




legs, like a dancing bear. It was immensely 
entertaining. 

The third time around he discovered me 
in the midst of one of his antics. He was 
so surprised that he fell down. In a second 
he was up again, sitting very straight on his 
haunches just in front of me, paws crossed, 
ears erect, eyes shining in fear and curiosity. 
" Who are you ? " he was saying, as plainly 
as ever rabbit said it. Without moving a 
muscle I tried to tell him, and also that he 
need not be afraid. Perhaps he began to 
understand, for he turned his head, as a dog 
does w^hen you talk to him. But he was not 
quite satisfied. " I'll try my scare on him," 
he thought ; and thump ! thump ! thump ! 
sounded his padded hind foot on the soft 
ground. It almost made me start again, it 
sounded so big in the dead stillness. This 
last test quite convinced him that I was 
harmless and, after a moment's watching, 
away he went in some astonishing jumps 
into the forest. 

A few minutes passed by in quiet waiting 
before he was back again, this time with two 



85 
"Br'er, 




BBif- 



86 




or three companions. I have no doubt that 
he had been watching me all the time, for I 
Brer ^^ Rabbi f heard his challenge in the brush just behind 
my log. The fun now began to grow lively. 
Around and around they went, here, there, 
everywhere ; the woods seemed full of rab- 
bits, they scurried around so. Every few 
minutes the number increased, as some new 
arrival came flying in and gyrated around 
like a brown fur pinwheel. They leaped 
over everything in the clearing ; they leaped 
over each other as if playing leap-frog ; they 
vied with each other in the high jump. 
Sometimes they gathered together in the 
middle of the open space and crept about 
close to the ground, in and out and round- 
about, like a game of fox and geese. Then 
they rose on their hind legs and hopped 
slowly about in all the dignity of a minuet. 
Right in the midst of the solemn affair some 
mischievous fellow gave a squeak and a big 
jump ; and away they all went hurry-skurry, 
for all the world like a lot of boys turned 
loose for recess. In a minute they were 
back again, quiet and sedate, and solemn as 




The woods seemed full of rabbits 




bullfrogs. Were they chasing and chastising 
the mischief-maker, or was it only the over- 
flow of abundant spirits, as the top of a Br'er jy Rabbit 
kettle blows off when the pressure below 
becomes resistless ? 

Many of the rabbits saw me, I am sure, 
for they sometimes gave a high jump over 
my foot ; and one came close up beside it, 
and sat up straight to look me over. Per- 
haps it was the first comer, for he did not 
try his scare again. Like most wild crea- 
tures, they have very little fear of an object 
that remains motionless at their first approach 
and challenge. 

Once there was a curious performance 
over across the clearing. I could not see it 
plainly, but it looked very much like a box- 
ing match. A queer sound, pul-a-puf-a-put- 
a-put, first drew my attention to it. Two 
rabbits were at the edge of the ferns, stand- 
ing up on their hind legs, face to face, and 
apparently cuffing each other soundly, while 
they hopped slowly around and around in a 
circle. I could not see the blows but only 
the boxing attitude, and hear the sounds as 



88 



Ml,lM 



they landed on each other's ribs. The other 
rabbits did not seem to mind it, as they 
^r'er^aSbif would have done had it been a fight, but 
n'' v-^^IV^ stopped occasionally to watch the two, and 
^^^^^^0^^, then went on with their fun-making. Since 
then I have read of tame hares that did the 
same thing, but I have never seen it. 

At another time the rabbits were gathered 
together in the very midst of some quiet fun, 
when they leaped aside suddenly and disap- 
peared among the ferns as if by magic. The 
next instant a dark shadow swept across the 
opening, almost into my face, and wheeled 
out of sight among the evergreens. It was 
Kookooskoos, the big brown owl, coursing 
the w^oods on his nightly hunt after the very 
rabbits that were crouched motionless be- 
neath him as he passed. But how did 
they learn, all at once, of the coming of an 
enemy whose march is noiseless as the 
sweep of a shadow .^ And did they all hide 
so well that he never suspected that they 
were about, or did he see the ferns wave as 
the last one disappeared, but was afraid to 
come back after seeing me ? Perhaps Br'er 



89 



Rabbit was well repaid that time for his 
confidence. 

They soon came back again, as they 3!r'e/* 
would not have done had it been a natural 
opening. Had it been one of Nature's own 
sunny spots, the owl would have swept back 
and forth across it ; for he knows the rab- 
bits' ways as well as they know his. But 
hawks and owls avoid a spot like this, that 
men have cleared. If they cross it once in 
search of prey, they seldom return. Wher- 
ever man camps, he leaves something of 
himself behind ; and the fierce birds and 
beasts of the woods fear it, and shun it. It 
is only the innocent things, singing birds, 
and fun-loving rabbits, and harmless little 
wood mice — shy, defenseless creatures all 
— that take possession of man's abandoned 
quarters, and enjoy his protection. Bunny 
knows this, I think ; and so there is no 
other place in the woods that he loves so 
well as an old camping ground. 

The play was soon over ; for it is only in 
the early part of the evening, when Br'er 
Rabbit first comes out, after sitting still in 






his form all day, that he gives himself up to 
fun, like a boy out of school. If one may 
Br^er ^^ Rabbi f judge, however, from the looks of Simmo's 
overalls, and from the number of times he 
woke me by scurrying around my tent, I 
suspect that he is never too serious and 
never too busy for a joke. It is a way he 
has of brightening the mo-re sober times of 
getting his own living, and keeping a sharp 
lookout for cats and owls and prowling foxes. 
Gradually the playground was deserted, as 
the rabbits slipped off one by one to hunt 
their supper. Now and then there was a 
scamper among the underbrush, and a high 
jump or two, with which some playful bunny 
enlivened his search for tender twigs ; and 
at times one, more curious than the rest,. 
came hopping along to sit erect a moment 
before the old log, and look to see if the 
strange animal were still there. But soon 
the old log was vacant too. Out in the 
swamp a disappointed owl sat on his lonely 
stub that lightning had blasted, and hooted 
that he was hungry. The moon looked 
down into the little clearing with its waving 



ferns and soft gray shadows, and saw nothing 
there to suggest that it was the rabbits' 
nursery. 

Down at the camp a new surprise was 
awaiting me. Br'er Rabbit was under the 
tent fly, tugging away at the salt bag, which 
I had left there carelessly after curing a 
bearskin. While he was absorbed in get- 
ting it out from under the rubber blanket, I 
crept up on hands and knees, and stroked 
him once from ears to tail. He jumped 
straight up with a startled squeak, whirled 
in the air, and came down facing me. So 
we remained for a full moment, our faces 
scarcely two feet apart, looking into each 
other's eyes. Then he thumped the earth 
soundly with his left hind foot, to show that 
he was not afraid, and scurried under the 
fly and through the brakes in a half circle to 
a bush at my heels, 
where he sat 
straight in the 
shadow to watch me. 



91 



Br'er Q Rabbit 







^^^J^^^^^-; 



.^' '' 






92 



Brer 




But I had seen enough for one night. I 
left a generous pinch of salt where he could 
Rabbit find it easily, and crept in to sleep, leaving 
him to his own ample devices. 






93 





' ~ HEREVER you find Keeonekh the 
otter you find three other things : 
wildness, beauty, and running water 
that no winter can freeze. There is 
also good fishing, but that will profit you 
little ; for after Keeonekh has harried a pool 
it is useless to cast your fly or minnow there. 
The largest fish has disappeared — you will 
find his bones and a fin or two on the ice 
or the nearest bank — and the little fish are 
still in hiding after their fright. 

Conversely, wherever you find the three 
elements mentioned you will also find Kee- 
onekh, if your eyes know how to read the 

95 



96 

^TieeonelQi 

the 

Fisherman 




signs aright. Even in places near the towns, 
where no otter has been seen for generations, 
they are still to be found leading their shy 
wild life, so familiar with every sight and 
sound of danger that no eye of the many 
that pass by ever sees them. No animal has 
been more persistently trapped and hunted 
for the valuable fur that he bears ; but Kee- 
onekh is hard to catch and quick to learn. 
When a family have all been caught or driven 
away from a favorite stream, another otter 
speedily finds the spot in some of his winter 
wanderings after better fishing, and, know- 
ing well from the signs that others of his race 
have paid the sad penalty for heedlessness, 
he settles down there with greater watchful- 
ness, and enjoys his fisherman's luck. 

In the spring he brings a mate to share 
his rich living. Soon a family of young 
otters go a-fishing in the best pools, and 
explore the stream for miles up and down. 
But so shy and wild and quick to hide are 
they that the trout fishermen who follow the 
river, and the ice fishermen who set their 
tilt-ups in the pond below, and the children 



who gather cowslips in the spring have no 
suspicion that the original proprietors of the 
stream are still on the spot, jealously watch- 
ing and resenting every intrusion. 

Occasionally the wood choppers cross an 
unknown trail in the snow, a heavy trail, with 
long, sliding, down-hill plunges which look as 
if a log had been dragged along. But they 
too go their way, wondering a bit at the 
queer things that live in the woods, but not 
understanding the plain records that the 
queer things leave behind them. Did they 
but follow far enough, they would find the 
end of the trail in open water, and on the ice 
beyond the signs of Keeonekh's fishing. 

I remember one otter family whose den I 
found, when a boy, on a stream between two 
ponds within three miles of the town house. 
Yet the oldest hunter could barely remember 
the time when the last otter had been caught 
or seen in the county. 

I was sitting very still in the bushes on 
the bank, one day in spring, watching for a 
wood duck. Wood duck lived there, but 
the cover was so thick that I could never 



97 

the ^^^^ 
Fisherman ^n 



'■■■ »#i teH/zK^^'' 



>^:^'i:?^:-% ^^•' 




p.'^' 




^ surprise them. They always heard me com- 
ing and were off, giving me only vanishing 
^eeoneKh glimpses among the trees ; or else they would 
w^'^ ffte hide among the sedges or under the tall 
water grass that hung over the bank, where 
no eye could find them, and lie low, like Br'er 
Rabbit, until I went by. So the only way to 
see them — a beautiful sight they were — 
was to sit still in hiding, for hours if need be, 
until they came gliding by, all unconscious of 
the watcher. 

As I waited a large animal came swiftly 
up stream, just his head visible, with a long 
tail trailing behind. He was swimming 
powerfully, steadily, straight as a string ; 
but, as I noted with wonder, he made no 
ripple whatever, sliding through the water 
as if greased from nose to tail. Just above 
me he dived, and I did not see him again, 
though I watched up and down stream 
breathlessly for him to reappear. 

I had never seen such an animal before, 
but I knew somehow that it was an otter, 
and I drew back into better hiding with 
the hope of seeing the rare creature again. 



99 



the 
Fisherman 



Presently another otter appeared, coming up 

stream and disappearing in exactly the same 

way as the first. But though I stayed all HeeoneliJ^ 

the afternoon I saw nothing more. 

After that I haunted the spot every time 
I could get away, creeping down to the river 
bank and lying in hiding, hours long at a 
stretch ; for I knew now that the otters lived 
there, and they gave me many glimpses of 
a life I had never seen before. 

Soon I found their den. It was in a bank 
opposite my hiding place, and the entrance 
w^as among the roots of a great tree, under 
water, where no one could have possibly 
found it, if the otters had not themselves 
shown the w^ay. In their approach they 
always dived while yet wxll out in the 
stream, and so entered their door unseen. 
When they came out they were quite as care- 
ful, always swimming some distance under 
water before coming to the surface. It was 
severa4<days before my eye could trace surely 
the faint undulation of the water above 
them, and so follov/ their course to their 
doorway. Had not the water been shallow 
LofC. 







I should never have found it ; for they are 
loo . -^ . 

the most wonderful of swimmers, making 

^eeonel^h no disturbance on the surface, and gliding 
T^*^ ^e beneath the water with the faintest sugges- 
tion of a ripple to tell what is passing — like 
the wake of a big pickerel, coming back to 
his den under the bank after his frog-hunting 
among the lily pads. 

Those were among the happiest watching 
hours that I have ever spent in the woods. 
The game was so large, so utterly unex- 
pected ; and I had the wonderful discovery 
all to myself. Not one of the half-dozen 
boys and men who occasionally, when the 
fever seized them, trapped muskrat in the 
wild meadow, a mile below, or the rare mink 
that hunted frogs in every brook, had any 
suspicion that such splendid fur was to be 
had for the trapping. 

Sometimes a whole afternoon would go 
slowly by, filled with the sounds and sweet 
smells of the woods, and not a ripple would 
break the dimples of the stream before me. 
But when, one late afternoon, just as the 
pines across the stream began to darken 



against the western light, a string of silver 

bubbles shot across the stream and a big 

otter rose to the surface with a pickerel in ^^^onel^h^^^ 

his mouth, all the watching that had not well pfsh^^^r^^^ 

repaid itself was swept out of the reckoning. ^Jf 

He came swiftly towards me, put his fore ^ 

111 . T "^ ^ 

paws agamst the bank, gave a wrigglmg 
jump, — and there he was, not twenty feet 
away, holding the pickerel down with his 
fore paws, his back arched like a frightened 
cat, and a tiny stream of w^ater trickling 
down from the tip of his heavy, pointed tail, 
as he ate his fish with immense relish. 

Years afterward, hundreds of miles away 
on the Dungarvon, in the heart of the wil- 
derness, every detail of the scene came back 
to me again. I was standing on snowshoes, 
looking out over the frozen river, when 
Keeonekh appeared in an open pool with a 
trout in his mouth. He broke his way, with 
a clattering tinkle of winter bells, through 
the thin edge of ice, put his paws against the 
heavy snow ice, threw himself out with the 
same wriggling jump, and ate with his back 
arched — just as I had seen him years before. 



This curious way of eating is, I think, char- 
acteristic of all otters ; certainly of those 
^eeonel<h ^^^^ ^ have been fortunate enough to see. 
^^^ /^e Why they do it is more than I know ; but it 
must be uncomfortable for every mouthful 
— full of fish bones, too — to slide uphill 
to one's stomach. Perhaps it is mere habit, 
which shows in the arched backs of all the 
weasel family. Perhaps it is to frighten any 
enemy that may approach unawares while 
Keeonekh is eating, just as an owl, when 
feeding on the ground, bristles up all his 
feathers, so as to look big as possible. 

But my first otter was too keen-scented 
to remain long so near a concealed enemy. 
Suddenly he stopped eating and turned his 
head in my direction. I could see his nos- 
trils twitching as the wind gave him its mes- 
sage. Then he left his fish, glided into the 
stream as noiselessly as the brook entered it 
below him, and disappeared without leaving 
a single wavelet to show where he had gone 
down. 

When the young otters appeared, there 
was one of the most interesting lessons to 



be seen in the woods. Thouo^h Keeonekh 
loves the water and lives in it more than 
half the time, his little ones are afraid of it ^^^^^^f^ 
as so many kittens. If left to themselves rZfjJ^^^ 
they would undoubtedly go off for a hunt- 
ing life, following the old family instinct; 
for fishing is an acquired habit of the otters, 
and so the fishing instinct cannot yet be 
transmitted to the little ones. That will 
take many generations. Meanwhile the 
little Keeonekhs must be taught to swim. 
One day the mother-otter appeared on the 
bank, among the roots of the great tree 
under which was her secret doorway. That 
was surprising, for up to this time both otters 
had always approached it from the river, and 
were never seen on the bank near their den. 
She appeared to be digging, but was im- 
mensely cautious about it, looking, listening, 
sniffing continually. I had never gone near 
the place for fear of frightening them away ; 
and it was months afterward, when the den 
was deserted, before I examined it to under- 
stand just what she was doing. Then I 
found that she had made another doorway 




from her den, leading^ out to the bank. She 
104 ^ 

had selected the spot with wonderful cun- 

y{eeone7(h ning, — a hollow under a great root that 

Pf^*^ ^^ would never be noticed, — and she dug: from 
hsnerman . . , . , , , , . 

mside, carrymg the earth down to the river 

bottom, so that there should be nothing 

about the tree to indicate the haunt of an 

animal. 

Long afterward, when I had grown better 
acquainted with Keeonekh's ways from much 
watching, I understood the meaning of all 
this. She was simply making a safe way 
out and in for the little ones, who were 
afraid of the water. Had she taken or 
driven them out of her own entrance under 
the river, they might easily have drowned 
ere they reached the surface. 

When the entrance was all ready she dis- 
appeared; but I have no doubt she was just 
inside, watching to be sure the coast was 
clear. Slowly her head and neck appeared 
till they showed clear of the black roots. 
She turned her nose up stream — nothing 
in the wind. Eyes and ears searched below 
— nothing harmful there. Then she came 



out, and after her toddled two little otters, 

. . 105 

full of wonder at the big bright world, full of 

fear at the river. TfegQ/igT^Zy-;^,^ 

There was no play at first, only wonder ^-^ i^ ^^^^BL 

and investigation. Caution was born in J^ 

them; they put their little feet down as if ^ ^ 

treading on eggs, and they sniffed every 

bush before going behind it. And the old 

mother noted their cunning with satisfac- 
tion, while her own nose and ears watched 

far away. 

The outing was all too short ; some uneasi- 
ness was in the air down stream. Suddenly 

she rose from where she was lying, and the 

little ones, as if commanded, tumbled back 

into the den. In a moment she had glided 

after them, and the bank was deserted. It 

was fully ten minutes before my untrained 

ears caught faint sounds, which were not of 

the woods, coming up stream; and longer 

than that before two men with fish poles 

appeared, making their slow way to the 

pond above. They passed almost over the 

den and disappeared, all unconscious of beast 

or man that wished them elsewhere, resenting 



io6 

y{eeoneliJi 

ffie 

Fisherman 




p. 







1: /'^ 



their noisy passage through the soHtudes. 
But the otters did not come out again, 
though I watched till nearly dark. 

It was a week before I saw them again, 
and some good teaching had evidently been 
done in the meantime; for all fear of the 
river was gone. They toddled out as before, 
at the same hour in the afternoon, and went 
straight to the bank. There the mother lay 
down, and the little ones, as if enjoying the 
frolic, clambered up to her back. Where- 
upon she slid into the stream and swam 
slowly about with the little Keeonekhs cling- 
ing to her desperately, as if humpty-dumpty 
had been played on them before, and might 
be repeated any moment. 

I understood their air of anxious expecta- 
tion a moment later, when Mother Otter 
dived like a flash from under them, leaving 
them to make their own way in the water. 
They began to swim naturally enough, 
but the fear of the new element was still 
upon them. The moment old Mother Otter 
appeared they made for her, whimpering ; but 
ved again and again, or moved slowly 




away, and so kept them swimming. After 
a little they seemed to tire and lose cour- 
age. Her eyes saw it quicker than mine, Tieeonekjr^^^ 

and she s^lided between them. Both little ^.^. ^^Si'^^B^ 
, . , 1 r 1 r J Sherman ^» 

ones turned m at the same mstant and lound ^ 

a resting place on her back. So she brought ^ ' 

them carefully to land again, and in a few 
moments they were all rolling about in the 
dry leaves like so many puppies. 

The den in the river bank was never dis- 
turbed, and the following year another litter 
was raised there. With characteristic cun- 
ning — a cunning which grows keener and 
keener in the neighborhood of civilization — 
the mother-otter filled up the land entrance 
among the roots with earth and driftweed, 
using only the doorway under water until it 
was time for the cubs to come out into the 
world again. 

Of all the creatures of the wilderness Kee- 
onekh is the most richly gifted, and his ways, 
could we but search them out, would furnish 
a most interesting chapter. Every journey 
he takes, whether by land or water, is full of 
unknown traits and tricks; but unfortunately 



no one ever sees him doing things, and most 

of his ways are yet to be found out. You 

^Tipeonel\h see a head holding swiftly across a wilder- 

T^T^ ;we j^ggg lake, or coming^ to meet your canoe on 
hsnerman . ^ r ^^ 

the streams; then, as you follow eagerly, a 





ce „^^=^^^ 



swirl and he is gone. When he comes up 
again he will watch you so much more 
keenly than you can possibly Vv^atch him 
that you learn little about him, except how 
shy he is. Even the trappers who make a 
business of catching him, and with whom 
I have often talked, know almost nothing of 
Keeonekh, except where to set their traps 
for him living and how to care for his skin 
when he is dead. 



* <5 



Once I saw him fishing in a curious way. 
It was winter, on a wilderness stream flow- 
ing into the Dungarvon. There had been a IKeeoneliJj^^^ 
fall of dry snow that still lay deep and powdery ^-^/l ^W*^Bl 

over all the woods, too light to settle or crust. Jf 

At every step one had to lift a shovelful of 
the stuff on the point of his snowshoe ; and 
I was tired out, following some caribou that 
wandered like plover in the rain. 

Just below me was a deep open pool sur- 
rounded by double fringes of ice. Early in 
the winter, while the stream was higher, the 
white ice had formed thickly on the river 
wherever the current was not too swift for 
freezing. Then the stream fell, and a shelf 
of new black ice formed at the water's level, 
eighteen inches or more below the first ice, 
some of which still clung to the banks, reach- 
ing out in places two or three feet and form- 
ing dark caverns with the ice below. Both 
shelves dipped towards the water, forming 
a gentle incline all about the edges of the 
open places. 

A string of silver bubbles shooting across 
the black pool at my feet roused me out of 



a drowsy weariness. There it was again, a 

rippling wave across the pool, which rose 

^eeoneI<h ^^ ^^ surface a moment later in a hun- 

^^ dred bubbles, tinkling like tiny bells as they 






broke in the keen air. Two or three times 
I saw it with growing wonder. Then some- 
thing stirred under the shelf of ice across 
the pool. An otter slid into the water; the 
rippling wave shot across again ; the bubbles 
broke at the surface ;. and I knew that he 
was sitting under the white ice below me, 
not twenty feet away. 

A whole family of otters, three or four of 
them, were fishing there at my feet in utter 
unconsciousness. Every little while the 
bubbles would shoot across from my side 
and, watching sharply, I would see Keeonekh 
slide out upon the lower shelf of ice, on the 
other side, and crouch there in the gloom, 
with back humped against the ice above 
him, eating his catch. The fish they caught 
were all small, evidently, for after a few min- 
utes he would throw himself flat on the ice, 
slide down the incline into the water, making 
no splash or disturbance as he entered, and 




With back humped against the ice above him, eating his catch 



the stringy of bubbles would shoot across to 

. Ill 

my side again. 

For a full hour I watched them breath- T^^^onefdj^-^^^ 

lessly, marveling at their skill. A small fish ^^ i^ ^gP^ffik 

is nimble game to follow and catch in his Jf 

own element. But at every slide Keeonekh ^ "" 

did it. Sometimes the rippling wave would 

shoot all over the pool, and the bubbles 

break in a wild tangle, as the fish darted 

and doubled below, with the otter after 

him. But it always ended the same way. 

Keeonekh would slide out upon the ice 

shelf, and hump his back, and begin to eat 

almost before the last bubble had tinkled 

behind him. 

Curiously enough, the rule of the salmon 
fishermen prevailed here in the wilderness : 
no two rods shall whip the same pool at 
the same time. I would see an otter lying 
ready on the ice, evidently waiting for the 
chase to end. Then, as another otter slid 
out beside him with his fish, in he would go 
like a flash and take his turn. For a while 
the pool was a lively place ; the bubbles had 
no rest. Then the plunges grew fewer and 






fewer, and the otters all disappeared into the 
ice caverns. 
T<eeoneJdt What became of them I could not make 
to*»^ ffye out ; and I was too chilled to watch longer. 
Above and below the pool the stream was 
frozen for a distance ; then there was more 
open water and more fishing. Whether they 
followed along the bank under cover of the 
ice to other pools, or simply slept where they 
were till hungry again, I never found out. 
Certainly they had taken up their abode in 
an ideal spot, and would not leave it will- 
ingly. The open pools gave excellent fish- 
ing, and the upper ice shelf protected them 
perfectly from all enemies. 

Once, a week later, I left the caribou and 
came back to the spot to watch awhile ; but 
the place was deserted. The black water 
gurgled and dimpled across the pool, and 
slipped away silently under the lower edge 
of ice, undisturbed by strings of silver bub- 
bles. The ice caverns were all dark and 
silent. The mink had stolen the fish heads, 
and there was no trace anywhere to show 
that it was Keeonekh's banquet hall. 



The swimming power of an otter, which 

was so evident there in the winter pool, is 

one of the most remarkable things in nature. T^GConeliJ^^^^ 

All other animals and birds, and even the ^? , ^•W'SBk 

nsherman ^w^ 

best modeled of modern boats, leave more or ^ 

less wake behind them when moving through ^ ^ 

the water. But Keeonekh leaves no more 
trail than a fish. This is partly because 
he keeps his body well submerged when 
swimming, partly because of the strong, deep, 
even stroke that drives him forward. Some- 
times I have wondered if the outer hairs 
of his coat — the waterproof covering that 
keeps his fur dry, no matter how long he 
swims — are not better oiled than in other 
animals ; which might account for the lack 
of ripple. I have seen him go down sud- 
denly and leave absolutely no break in the 
surface to show where he was. When slid- 
ing also, plunging down a twenty-foot clay 
bank, he enters the water with an astonish- 
ing lack of noise or disturbance of any kind. 
In swimming at the surface he seems to 
use all four feet, like other animals. But 
below the surface, when chasing fish, he 



114 



fhe 
Fisherman 




uses only the fore paws. The hind legs 
then stretch straight out behind and are 
T{eeone7{h used, with the heavy tail, for a great rudder. 
By this means he turns and doubles like a 
flash, following surely the swift dartings of 
frightened trout, and beating them by sheer 
speed and nimbleness. 

When fishing a pool he always hunts 
outward from the center, driving the fish 
towards the bank, keeping himself within 
their circlings, and so having the immense 
advantage of the shorter line in heading off 
his game. The fish are seized as they 
crouch against the bank for protection, or 
try to dart out past him. Large fish are 
frequently caught from behind, as they lie 
resting in their spring-holes. So swift and 
noiseless is his approach that they are seized 
before they become aware of danger. 

This swimming power of Keeonekh is all 
the more astonishing when one remembers 
that he is a land animal, with none of the 
special endowments of the seal, who is his 
only rival as a fisherman. Nature undoubt- 
edly intended him to get his living, as the 




115 



other members of his large family do, by 

hunting in the woods, and endowed him 

accordingly. He is a strong runner, a good T^GeoneTj Jigggg^ 

climber, a patient, tireless hunter, and his /y^A^^^^^Bl 

nose is keen as a brier. With a little prac- dr 

tice he could again get his living by hunting, ^ '^ 

as his ancestors did. If squirrels and rats 

and rabbits were too nimble at first, there 

are plenty of musquash to be caught, and he 

need not stop at a fawn or a sheep ; for he is 

enormously strong, and the grip of his jaws 

is not to be loosened. 

In severe winters, when fish are scarce or 
his pools frozen over, he takes to the woods 
boldly and shows himself a master at hunt- 
ing craft. But he likes fish, and likes the 
water, and for many generations now has 
been simply a fisherman, with many of the 
quiet, lovable traits that belong to fishermen 
in general. 

That is one thing to give you instant 
sympathy for Keeonekh — he is so different, 
so far above all other members of his tribe. 
He is very gentle by nature, with no trace 
of the fisher's ferocity or the weasel's blood- 






^ thirstiness. He tames easily, and makes the 
ii6 . . ^ 

most docile and affectionate pet of all the 
^eeonelih wood folk. He never kills for the sake of 
fe^^^ ffte killing, but lives peaceably, so far as he can, 
with all creatures. And he stops fishing 
when he has caught his dinner. He is also 
most cleanly in his habits, with no sugges- 
tion whatever of the evil odors that cling to 
the mink and defile the whole neighborhood 
of a skunk. One cannot help wondering 
whether just going fishing has not wrought 
all this wonder in Keeonekh's disposition. 
If so, 'tis a pity that all his tribe do not 
turn fishermen. 

His one enemy among the wood folk, so 
far as I have observed, is the beaver. As 
the latter is also a peaceable animal, it is 
difficult to account for the hostility. I have 
heard or read somewhere that Keeonekh is 
fond of young beaver and hunts them occa- 
sionally to vary his diet of fish ; but I have 
never found any evidence in the wilderness 
to show this. Instead, I think it is simply a 
matter of the beaver's dam and pond that 
causes the trouble. 



117 



When the dam is built the beavers often 

dig a channel around either end to carry off 

the surplus water, and so prevent their handi- Tieeoneliji^^^ 

work being: washed away in a freshet. Then '\'L9 , ^^^^ffii 
- , 11 -11 hsherman ^Bk 

the beavers guard their preserve jealously, ^ 

driving away the wood folk that dare to <^ -* 

cross their dam or enter their ponds, espe- 
cially the musquash, who is apt to burrow 
and cause them no end of trouble. But 
Keeonekh, secure in his strength, holds 
straight through the pond, minding his 
ow^n business and even taking a fish or two 
in the deep places near the dam. He de- 
lights also in running water, especially in 
winter when lakes and streams are mostly 
frozen, and in his journeyings he makes use 
of the open channels that guard the beavers' 
work. But the moment the beavers hear a 
splashing there, or note a disturbance in the 
pond where Keeonekh is chasing fish, down 
they come full of wrath. And there is gener- 
ally a desperate fight before the affair is 
settled. 

Once, on a little pond, I saw a fierce battle 
going on out in the middle, and paddled 




^ hastily to find out about it. Two beavers 

and a big otter were locked in a death 

lieeoneKh struggle, diving, plunging, throwing them- 

^^ selves out of water, and snapping at each 
Fisherman ^i , ^i 

other s throats. 

As my canoe halted, the otter gripped one 
of his antagonists and went under with him. 
There was a terrible commotion below the 
surface for a few moments. When it ended 
the beaver rolled up dead, and Keeonekh 
shot up under the second beaver to repeat 
the attack. They gripped on the instant, 
but the second beaver, an enormous fellow, 
refused to go under, where he would be at 
a disadvantage. In my eagerness I let the 
canoe drift almost upon them, driving them 
wildly apart before the common danger. 
The otter held on his way up the lake ; the 
beaver turned towards the shore, where I 
noticed for the first time a couple of beaver 
houses. 

In this case there was no chance for intru- 
sion on Keeonekh's part. He had probably 
been attacked when going peaceably about 
his business through the lake. 



It is barely possible, however, that there 
was an old grievance on the beavers' part, 
which they sought to square when they TieeoneTjTi^^!^^ 
caug^ht Keeonekh on the lake. When ^^ , ^IP'^Bl 
beavers build their houses on the lake ^Jr 

shore, without the necessity for making a & ^ 

dam, they generally build a tunnel slanting 
up from the lake's bed to their den or house 
on the bank. Now Keeonekh fishes under 
the ice in winter more than is generally 
supposed. As he must breathe after every 
chase, he must needs know all the air-holes 
and dens in the whole lake. No matter how 
much he turns and doubles in the chase 
after a trout, he never loses his sense of 
direction, never forgets where the breathing 
places are. When his fish is seized he makes 
a bee line under the ice for the nearest place 
where he can breathe and eat. Sometimes 
this lands him, out of breath, in the beaver's 
tunnel ; and the beaver must sit upstairs 
in his own house, nursing his wrath, while 
Keeonekh eats fish in his hallway ; for there 
is not room for both at once in the tunnel, 
and a fight there or under the ice is out of 



20 



^eeoneT^h 

fhe 

Fisherman 





the question. As the beaver eats only bark 
— the white inner layer of "popple " bark is 
his chief dainty — he cannot understand and 
cannot tolerate this barbarian, who eats raw 
fish, and leaves the bones and fins and the 
smell of slime in his doorway. The beaver 
is exemplary in his neatness, detesting all 
smells and filth ; and this may possibly 
account for some of his enmity and his 
savage attacks upon Keeonekh when he 
catches him in a good place. 

Not the least interesting of Keeonekh's 
queer ways is his habit of sliding down hill, 
which makes a bond of sympathy and brings 
him close to the boyhood memories of those 
who know him. 

I remember one pair of otters that I 
watched, for the better part of a sunny after- 
noon, sliding down a clay bank with endless 
delight. The slide had been made, with 
much care evidently, on the steep side of a 
little promontory that jutted into the river. 
It was very steep, about twenty feet high, 
and had been made perfectly smooth by 




much slidinsr and wettina^-down. An otter 

^ ^ 121 

would appear at the top of the bank, throw 

himself forward on his belly and shoot down- TieeoneTQi 

ward like a flash, divine^ deep under water %9 , ^^^ 

.? - . hsherman 

and reappearmg some distance out from the 

foot of the slide. And all this with marvel- 
ous stillness, as if the very woods had ears 
and were listening to betray the shy crea- 
tures at their fun. For it was fun, pure and 
simple, and fun with no end of tingle and 
excitement in it, especially when one tried to 
catch the other and shot into the water at 
his very heels. 

This slide was in perfect condition, and 
the otters were careful not to roughen it. 
They never scrambled up over it, but went 
round the point and climbed from the other 
side ; or else went up parallel to the slide, 
some distance away, where the ascent was 
easier and where there was no danger of 
rolling stones or sticks upon the coasting 
ground to spoil its smoothness. 

In winter the snow makes better coasting 
than the clay. Moreover it soon grows hard 
and icy from the freezing of the water left 



122 




by the otter's body, and after a few days the 

sHde is as smooth as glass. Then coasting 

^Tipeonel^h is perfect, and every otter, old and young, 

™^**' fne j^g^g }^jg favorite slide and spends part of 
nsherman , . . . \ , 

every pleasant day enjoying the tun. 

When traveling through the woods in deep 
snow, Keeonekh makes use of his sliding 
habit to help him along, especially on down 
grades. He runs a little way and throws 
himself forward on his belly, sliding through 
the snow for several feet before he runs again. 
So his progress is a series of slides, much as 
one hurries along in slippery weather. 

I have spoken of the silver bubbles that 
first drew my attention to the fishing otters, 
one day in the wilderness. From the few 
rare opportunities that I have had to watch 
them, I think that the bubbles are seen 
only after Keeonekh slides swiftly into the 
stream. The air clings to the hairs of his 
rough outer coat and is brushed from them 
as he passes through the water. One who 
watches him thus, shooting down the long 
slide belly-bump into the black winter pool, 
with a string of silver bubbles breaking and 



tinkling above him, is apt to know the 
hunter's change of heart from the touch of 
Nature which makes us all kin. Thereafter TieeoneTjJi^gs^ 
he eschews trapping^ — at least you will not %? t ^^SlPSjk 
find his number-three trap at the foot of ^ 

Keeonekh's slide any more, to turn the shy ^ ^ 

creature's happiness into tragedy — and he 
sends a hearty good-luck after his fellow- 
fisherman, whether he meet him on the 
wilderness lakes or in the quiet places on 
the home streams, where nobody ever comes. 








125 



MOOWEEN THE BEAR 



5 VER since nurs- 

^ ery times Bruin 

has been largely 

a creature of 

imagina t i on. 

He dwells there, a 

ferocious beast, 

prowl ing about 

gloomy woods, red 

eyed and dangerous, 

ready to rush upon 

the unwary traveler 

and eat him on the 

spot. 

But Mooween the 

Bear, as the northern 

Indians call him, is a 

very different kind of creature. He is big 

and glossy black, with long white teeth and 

127 








o sharp black claws, like the imagination bear. 
Unlike him, however, he is shy and wild, and 
^Tiooween timid as any rabbit. When you camp in the 
ifiG wilderness at nis^ht, the rabbit will come out 
of his form in the ferns to pull at your shoe, 
or nibble a hole in the salt bag, while you 
sleep. He will play twenty pranks under 
your very eyes. But if you would see Moo- 
ween, you must camp many summers, and 
tramp many a weary mile through the big 
forests before catching a glimpse of him, or 
seeing any trace save the deep tracks, like a 
barefoot boy's, left in some soft bit of earth 
in his hurried flight. 

Mooween's ears are quick, and his nose 
very keen. The slightest warning from 
either will generally send him off to the 
densest cover or the roughest hillside in the 
neighborhood. Silently as a black shadow 
he glides away, if he has detected your 
approach from a distance. But if surprised 
and frightened, he dashes headlong through 
the brush, with crash of branches and bump 
of fallen logs, and volleys of dirt and dead 
wood flung out behind him as he digs his 



toes into the hillside in his frantic haste to 
be away. 

In the first startled instant of such an 
encounter, one thinks there must be twenty 
bears scrambling up the hill. And if you 
should perchance get a glimpse of the game, 
you will be conscious chiefly of a funny little 
pair of wrinkled black feet, turned up at you 
so rapidly that they actually seem to twinkle 
through a cloud of frying loose stuff. 

That w^as the way in which I first met 
Mooween. He was feeding peaceably on 
blueberries, w^hen I came round the turn of 
a deer path. There he was, the mighty, 
ferocious beast — and my only weapon a 
trout-rod ! 

We discovered each other at the same 
instant. Words can hardly measure the 
mutual consternation. I felt scared ; and in 
a moment it flashed upon me that he looked 
so. This last observation was like a breatli 
of inspiration. It led me to make a demon- 
stration before he should regain his wats. I 
jumped forward w^ith a flourish, and threw 
my hat at him. — 



129 

T^oocueen 

ihe 

^Bear 




no 



130 



Bear 



Boo ! said I. 

Hoof, woof ! said Mooween. And away 
^nfooween he went up the hill in a desperate scramble, 
^^ with loose stones rattling, and the bottoms of 
his feet showing constantly through the vol- 
ley of dirt and chips flung out behind him. 

That killed the fierce imagination bear of 
childhood days deader than any bullet could 
have done, and convinced me that Mooween 
is at heart a timid creature. Still, this was 
a young bear, as was also one other upon 
whom I tried the same experiment with the 
same result. Had he been older and bigger, 
it might have been different. In that case I 
have found that a good rule is to go your 
own way unobtrusively, leaving Mooween to 
his devices. All animals, whether wild or 
domestic, respect a man who neither fears 
nor disturbs them. 

Mooween 's eyes are his weak point. They 
are close together, and seem to focus on the 
ground a few^ feet in front of his nose. At 
twenty yards to leeward he can never tell 
you from a stump or a caribou, should you 
chance to be standing still. 



131 



If fortunate enough to find the ridge 
where he sleeps away the long summer 
days, one is almost sure to get a glimpse of liooween 
him by ^vatchino- on the lake below. It is 5?^ 
necessary only to sit perfectly still in your 
canoe among the water grasses. When near 
a lake, a bear will almost invariably come 
down about noontime to sniff carefully all 
about, and lap the water, and perhaps find a 
dead fish before going back for his afternoon 
sleep. 

Four or five times I have sat thus in my 
canoe, while Mooween passed close by and 
never suspected my presence till a chirp 
drew his attention. It is curious at such 
times, when there is no wind to bring the 
scent to his keen nose, to see him turn his 
head to one side, and wrinkle his forehead 
in the vain endeavor to make out the curi- 
ous object there in the grass. At last he 
rises on his hind legs, and stares long and 
intently. It seems as if he must recognize 
you, with his nose pointing straight at 
you, his eyes looking straight into yours. 
But he drops on all fours again, and glides 




■^s 




- j-'v' 










silently into the thick bushes that fring^e 

132 -^ ^ 

the shore. 
y^ooween Don't stir now, nor make the least sound. 
^ ffte He is in there, just out of sight, sitting on 
his haunches, using nose and ears to catch 
your slightest message. 

Ten minutes pass by in intense silence. 
Down on the shore, fifty yards below, a slight 
swaying of the bilberry bushes catches your 
eye. That surely is not the bear ! There 
has not been a sound since he disappeared. 
A squirrel could hardly creep through that 
underbrush without noise enough to tell 
where he was. But the bushes sway again, 
and Mooween reappears suddenly for an- 
other long look at the suspicious object. 
Then he turns and plods his way along 
shore, rolling his head from side to side. as 
if completely mystified. 

Now swing your canoe well out into the 
lake, and head him off on the point, a quarter 
of a mile below. Hold the canoe quiet, just 
outside the lily pads, by grasping a few tough 
stems, and sit low. This time the big object 
catches Mooween's eye as he rounds the 



point ; and you have only to sit still to see 
him Q-o throug^h the same maneuvers with 
greater mystification than before. 

Once, however, he varied his program, 
and gave me a terrible start, letting me know 
for a moment just how it feels to be hunted, 
at the same time showing with what mar- 
velous stillness he can glide through the 
thickest cover when he chooses. 

It was early evening on a forest lake. The 
water lay like a great mirror, with the sun- 
set splendor still upon it. The hush of 
twilight was over the wilderness. Only the 
hermit thrushes sang wild and sweet from a 
hundred dead spruce tops. 

I was drifting about, partly in the hope 
to meet Mooween, whose tracks were very 
numerous at the lower end of the lake, when 
I heard him walking in the shallow water. 
Through the glass I made him out against 
the shore, as he plodded along in my direc- 
tion. 

I had long been curious to know how 
near a bear would come to a man without 
discovering him. Here was an opportunity. 



^33 

T^ooween 

ff)e 

^Bear 





The wind at sunset had been in my favor ; 
134 . -^ ' 

now there was not the faintest breath 
^Nooween stirring. 

ffie Hiding the canoe, I sat down in the sand 
uear ^^ ^ little point, where dense bushes grew 
down to within a few feet of the water's 
edge. Head and shoulders were in plain 
sight above the water grass. My intentions 
were wholly peaceable, notwithstanding the 
rifle that lay across my knees. It was near 
the mating season, when Mooween's temper 
is often dangerous ; and one felt much more 
comfortable with the chill of the cold iron 
in his hands. 

Mooween came rapidly along the shore 
meanwhile, evidently anxious to reach the 
other end of the lake. In the mating season 
bears use the margins of lakes and streams 
as natural highways. As he drew nearer and 
nearer I gazed with a kind of fascination at 
the big unconscious brute. He carried his 
head low, and dropped his feet with a heavy 
splash into the shallow water. 

At twenty yards he stopped, as if struck, 
with head up and one paw lifted, sniffing 



V 



suspiciously. Even then he did not see me, 
though only the open shore lay between us. 
He did not use his eyes at all, but laid his 
great head back on his shoulders and sniffed 
in every direction, rocking his brown muzzle 
up and down the while, so as to take in every 
atom from the tainted air. 

A few slow careful steps forward, and he 
stopped again, looked straight into my eyes, 
then beyond me toward the lake, all the 
while sniiiing. I was still only part of the 
shore. Yet he was so near that I caught the 
gleam of his eyes, and saw the nostrils swell 
and the muzzle twitch nervously. 

Another step or two, and he planted his 
fore feet firmly. The long hairs began to 
rise along his spine, and under his wrinkled 
chops was a flash of white teeth. Still he 
had no suspicion of the motionless object 
there in the grass. He looked rather out 
on the lake. Then he glided into the brush 
and was lost to sight and hearing. 

He was so close that I scarcely dared 
breathe as I waited, expecting him to come 
out farther down the shore. Five minutes 



135 

T^ootueen 

ihe 

'Bear 







^ passed without the slightest sound to indi- 
cate his whereabouts, though I was listening 
^Tiooween intently in the dead hush that was on the 
ffte lake. All the while I smelled him strongly. 
One can smell a bear almost as far as he 
can a deer ; though the scent does not cling- 
so long to the underbrush. 

A bush swayed slightly, below where he 
had disappeared. I was watching it closely 
when some sudden warning — I know^ not 
what, for I did not hear but only felt it — 
made me turn my head quickly. There, not 
six feet away, a huge head and shoulders 
were thrust out of the bushes on the bank, 
and a pair of gleaming eyes were peering 
intently down upon me in the grass. He 
had been watching me, at arm's length, prob- 
ably two or three minutes. Had a muscle 
moved in all that time, I have no doubt that 
he would have sprung upon me. As it was, 
who can say what was passing behind that 
^ curious, half-puzzled, half-savage gleam in 

his eyes t 

He drew quickly back as a sudden move- 
ment on my part threw the rifle into position. 




A huge head and shoulders were thrust out of the bushes 



A few minutes later I heard the snap of a twig, 
some distance away. Not another sound told 
of his presence till he broke out onto the 
shore, fifty yards above, and went steadily 
on his way up the lake. 

Mooween is something of a humorist in 
his own way. When not hungry he will go 
out of his way to frighten a bullfrog from his 
sun-bath on the shore, for no other purpose, 
evidently, than just to see him jump. Watch- 
ing him thus amusing himself, one afternoon, 
I was immensely entertained by seeing him 
turn his head to one side, and wrinkle his 
eyebrows, as each successive frog said ke' 
dmik! and went splashing away over the lily 
pads. 

A pair of cubs are playful as young foxes, 
while their extreme awkwardness makes them 
a dozen times more comical. Simmo, my 
Indian guide, tells me that the cubs will 
sometimes run away and hide when they 
hear the mother bear returning. No amount 
of coaxing or of anxious fear on her part will 
bring them back, till she searches diligently 
to find them. 



"^11 

'Tlooween 

ifie 

'Bear 




138 

^ooween 

the 



(f 








Once only have I had opportunity to see 
the young at play. There were two of them, 
nearly full-grown, with the mother. The 
most curious thing was to see them stand 
up on their hind legs and cuff each other 
soundly, striking and warding like trained 
boxers. Then they would lock arms and 
wrestle desperately till one was thrown, when 
the other promptly seized him by throat or 
paw, and pretended to growl frightfully. 

They were well fed, evidently, and full of 
good spirits as two boys. But the mother 
was cross and out of sorts. She kept mov- 
ing about uneasily, as if the rough play irri- 
tated her nerves. Occasionally, as she sat 
for a moment with hind legs stretched out 
flat and fore paws planted between them, 
one of the cubs would approach and attempt 
some monkey play. A sound cuff on the ear 
invariably sent him whimpering back to his 
companion, who looked droll enough the 
while, sitting with his tongue out and his 
head wagging humorously as he watched the 
experiment. It was getting toward the time 
of year when she would send them off into 



.f- 



■=•^3 



I'j v^L<'' 






s^K,^ ' 









# 



/4y 



/\tl>^ 



the world to shift for themselves. And this 
was perhaps their first hard discipline. 

Once also I caught an old bear enjoying 
himself in a curious way. It was one in- 
tensely hot day, in the heart of a New Bruns- 
wick wdlderness. Mooween came out upon 
the lake shore and lumbered along, twisting 
uneasily and rolling his head, as if distressed 
by the heat. I followed silently, close behind, 
in my canoe. 

Soon he came to a cool spot under the 
alders ; which was probably what he was 
looking for. A small brook made an eddy 
there, and a lot of driftweed had collected 
over a bed of soft black mud. The stump 
of a huge cedar leaned out over it, some four 
or five feet above the water. 

First he waded in to try the temperature. 
Then he came out and climbed the cedar 
stump, where he sniffed in every direction, 
as is his wont before lying down. Satisfied 
at last, he balanced himself carefully and 
gave a big jump, with legs out fiat, and paws 
up, and mouth open as if he were laughing 
at himself. Down he came, souse ! with a 



139 
'Tiooween 




140 

y^ooojeen 
the 
Bear 




tremendous splash that sent mud and water 
flying in every direction. And with a deep 
uff-guff! of pure delight, he settled himself in 
his cool bed for a comfortable nap. 

In his fondness for fish, Mooween has dis- 
covered an interesting way of catching them. 
In June and July immense numbers of trout 
and salmon run up the wilderness rivers on 
their way to the spawning grounds. Here 
and there, on small streams, are shallow 
riffles, where large fish are often half out of 
w^ater as they struggle up. On one of these 
riffles Mooween stations himself during the 
first bright moonlight nights of June, when 
the run of fish is largest, on account of the 
higher tides at the river mouth. And Moo- 
ween knows, as well as any other fisherman, 
the kind of night on which to go a-fishing. 
He knows also the virtue of keeping still. 
As a big salmon struggles by, Mooween slips 
a paw under him, tosses him to the shore by 
a dexterous flip, and springs after him before 
he can flounder back. 

When hungry, Mooween has as many 
devices as a fox for getting a meal. He 



141 



tries flipping frogs from among the lily pads 

in the same way that he catches salmon. 

That failing, he takes to creeping through Tiootueen 

the water grass, like a mink, and striking his ^^ 

game dead with a blow of his paw. 

Or he finds a porcupine loafing through 
the woods, and follows him about to flip 
dirt and stones at him, carefully refraining 
from touching him the while, till the porcu- 
pine rolls himself into a ball of bristling 
quills, — his usual method of defense. Moo- 
ween slips a paw under him, flips him against 
a tree to stun him, and bites him in the belly, 
where there are no quills. If he spies the 
porcupine in a tree, he will climb up, if he is 
a young bear, and try to shake him off. But 








no 



142 



^Bear 



he soon learns better, and saves his strength 
for more fruitful exertions. 
^T^ootueen Mooween goes to the lumber camps regu- 
fhe larly after his winter sleep and, breaking in 
through door or roof, helps himself to what 
he finds. If there happens to be a barrel of 
pork there, he will roll it into the open air 
before breaking in the head with a blow of 
his paw. 

Should he find a barrel of molasses among 
the stores, his joy is unbounded. The head 
is broken in on the instant and Mooween 
eats till he is surfeited. Then he lies down 
and rolls in the sticky sweet, to prolong the 
pleasure ; and stays in the neighborhood till 
every drop has been lapped up. 

Lumbermen have long since learned of 
his strength and cunning in breaking into 
their strong camps. When valuable stores 
are left in the woods, they are put into 
special camps, called bear camps, where 
doors and roofs are fastened with chains and 
ingenious log locks to keep Mooween out. 

Near the settlements Mooween speedily 
locates the sweet apple trees among the 



orchards. These he cHmbs by night, and 
shakes off enough apples to last him for 
several visits. Every kind of domestic ani- 
mal is game for him. He will lie at the 
edge of a clearing for hours, with the patience 
of a cat, waiting for turkey or sheep or pig 
to come within range of his swift rush. 

His fondness for honey is well known. 
When he has discovered a rotten tree in 
which wild bees have hidden their store, he 
will claw at the bottom till it falls. Curling 
one paw under the log he sinks the claws 
deep into the wood. The other paw grips 
the log opposite the first, and a single wrench 
lays it open. The clouds of angry insects 
about his head, meanwhile, are as little 
regarded as so many flies. He knows the 
thickness of his skin, and they know it. 
When the honey is at last exposed, and 
begins to disappear in great hungry mouth- 
fuls, the bees also fall upon it, to gorge 
themselves with the fruit of their hard labor 
before Mooween shall have eaten it all. 

Everything eatable in the woods ministers 
at times to Mooween's need. Nuts and 



143 

T^ooween 

if}e 

'Bear 




M 



k\i", 








no 

if 



berries are favorite dishes in their season. 
144 

When these and other delicacies fail, he 

y^ooofeen knows where to dig for edible roots. A 

^^ bisf caribou, wanderins: near his hiding: place, 

Bear - & r ^ 

is pulled down and stunned by a blow on 

the head. Then, when the meat has lost its 

freshness, he will hunt for an hour after a 

wood mouse he has seen run under a stone, 

or pull a rotten log to pieces for the ants and 

larvae concealed within. 

These last are favorite dishes with him. 
In a burned district, where ants and berries 
abound, one is continually finding charred 
logs, in which the ants nest by thousands, 
split open from end to end. A few strong 
claw marks, and the lick of a moist tongue 
here and there, explain the matter. It shows 
the extremes of Mooween's taste. Next to 
honey he prefers red ants, which are sour as 
pickles. 

Mooween is even more expert as a boxer 
than as a fisherman. When the skin is 
stripped from his fore arms, they are seen to 
be of great size, with muscles as firm to the 
touch as so much rubber. Long practice 



has made him immensely strong, and quick 
as a flash to ward and strike. Woe be to the 
luckless dog, however large, that ventures in 
the excitement of the hunt within reach of 
his paw. A single stroke will generally put 
the poor brute out of the hunt forever. 

Once Simmo caught a bear by the hind 
leg in a steel trap. It was a young bear, a 
two-year-old ; and Simmo thought to save 
his precious powder by killing it with a club. 
He cut a heavy maple stick and, swinging 
it high above his head, advanced to the trap. 
Mooween rose to his hind legs, and looked 
him steadily in the eye, like the trained 
boxer that he is. Down came the club with 
a sweep to have felled an ox. There was a 
flash from Mooween's paw ; the club spun 
away into the woods ; and Simmo just 
escaped a fearful return blow by dropping 
to the ground and rolling out of reach, 
leaving his cap in Mooween's claws. A 
wink later, and his scalp would have hung 
there instead. 

In the mating season, when three or four 
bears often roam the woods together in 



145 

TiGotueen 

ifie 

^Bear 




146 




fighting humor, Mooween uses a curious 

kind of challenge. Rising on his hind legs 

^Tiootueen against a big fir or spruce, he tears the bark 

^^ with his claws as hie^h as he can reach on 
Bean . . . . 

either side. Then, placing his back against 

the trunk, he turns his head and bites into 

the tree with his long canine teeth, tearing 

out a mouthful of the wood. That is to let 

all rivals know just how big a bear he is. 

The next bear that comes along on the 
trail, seeking perhaps to win the mate of his 
rival, sees the challenge and measures his 
height and reach in the same way, against 
the same tree. If he can bite and reach as 
high, or higher, he keeps on, and a terrible 
fight is sure to follow. But if, with his 
best endeavors, his marks fall short of the 
deep scars above, he prudently withdraws, 
and leaves it to a bigger bear to risk an 
encounter. 

In the wilderness one occasionally finds a 
tree on which three or four bears have thus 
left their challenge. Sometimes all the 
bears in a neighborhood seem to have left 
their records in the same place. I remember 



well one such tree, a big fir, by a lonely 
little beaver pond, where the separate chal- 
lenges had become indistinguishable on the 
torn bark. The freshest marks here were 
those of a long-limbed old ranger — a mon- 
ster he must have been — with a clear reach 
of a foot above his nearest rival. Evidently 
no other bear had cared to try after such a 
record. 

Once, in the same season, I discovered 
quite by accident that Mooween can be 
called, like a hawk or a moose, or indeed any 
other wild creature, if one but knows how. 
It was in New Brunswick, where I was 
camped on a wild forest river. At midnight 
I was back at a little opening in the woods, 
watching some hares at play in the bright 
moonlight. When they had run away, I 
called a wood mouse from his den under a 
stump ; .and then a big brown owl from 
across the river — which almost scared the 
life out of my poor little wood mouse. Sud- 
denly a strange cry sounded far back on the 
mountain. I listened curiously, then imi- 
tated the cry, in the hope of hearing it 



147 

T^ootueen 

ihe 

'Bear 




148 



y^ooween 

me 

Bear 





again and of remembering it ; for I had 
never before heard the sound, and had no 
idea what creature produced it. There was 
no response, however, and I speedily grew 
interested in the owls ; for by this time two 
or three more were hooting about me, all 
called in by the first comer. When they 
had gone I tried the strange call again. 
Instantly it was answered close at hand. 
The creature was coming. 

I stole out into the middle of the opening, 
and sat very still on a fallen log. Ten min- 
utes passed in intense silence. Then a twig 
snapped behind me. I turned — and there 
was Mooween, just coming into the opening. 
I shall not soon forget how he looked, stand- 
ing there big and black in the moonlight ; 
nor the growl deep down in his throat, that 
grew deeper as he watched me. We looked 
straight into each other's eyes a brief, uncer- 
tain moment. Then he drew back silently 
into the dense shadow. 

There is another side to Mooween's char- 
acter, fortunately a rare one, which is some- 
times evident in the mating season, when his 



temper leads him to attack instead of run- 
ning away, as usual ; or when wounded, or 
cornered, or roused to frenzy in defense of 
the young. Mooween is then a beast to be 
dreaded, a great savage brute, possessed of 
enormous strength and of a fiend's cunning. 
I have followed him wounded through the 
wilderness, when his every resting place was 
scarred with deep gashes, and where broken 
saplings testified mutely to the force of his 
blow. Yet even here his natural timxidity 
lies close to the surface, and his ferocity has 
been greatly exaggerated by hunters. 

Altogether, Mooween the bear is a peace- 
able fellow, and an interesting one, well 
worth studying. His extreme wariness, 
however, generally enables him to escape 
observation ; and there are undoubtedly 
many of his queer ways yet to be discovered 
by some one who, instead of scaring the life 
out of him by a shout or a rifle-shot, in the 
rare moments when he shows himself, will 
have the patience to creep near and find out 
just what he is doing. Only in the deepest 
wilderness is he natural and unconscious. 



149 

liooween 

ffie 

^3 ear 




I50 

y^ooween 

fhe 




There he roams about, entirely alone for the 
most part, supplying his numerous wants, 
and performing droll capers with all the 
gravity of an owl, when he thinks that not 
even Tookhees the wood mouse is looking. 







pj 



S -i<« 




151 


























NE day in the wilderness, as my canoe 
was sweeping down a beautiful stretch 
of river, I noticed a little path leading 
through the water grass, at right angles to 
the stream's course. Swinging my canoe up 
to it, I found what seemed to be a landing 
place for the wood folk on their river jour- 
neyings. The sedges, which stood thickly 
all about, were here bent inward, making a 
shiny green channel from the river. 

On the muddy shore were many tracks of 



mink and muskrat and otter, 
moose had stood drinking ; 

153 



Here a big 
and there a 



<.% 



K%- 



beaver had cut the s^rass and made a little 
154 . . . ^ 

mud pie, in the middle of which was a bit of 
, -„ . „^.' yj musk scenting the whole neighborhood. It 
^//d^ness was done last night, for the marks of his fore 
^^ *. ^^ -^ ^ paws still showed plainly where he had patted 
his pie smooth ere he went away. 

But the spot was more than a landing 
place ; a path went up the bank into the 
woods, as faint as the green waterway among 
the sedges. Tall ferns bent over to hide it ; 
rank grasses that had been softly brushed 
aside tried their best to look natural ; the 
alders waved their branches thickly, saying : 
" There is no way here." But there it was, 
a path for the wood folk. And when I fol- 
lowed it into the shade and silence of the 
woods, the first mossy log that lay across it" 
was worn smooth by the passage of many 
little feet. 

As I came back, Simmo's canoe glided 
into sight and I waved him to shore. The 
light birch swung up beside mine, a deep 
water-dimple just under the curl of its bow, 
and a musical ripple like the gurgle of water 
by a mossy stone — that was the only sound. 



155 



4> 



" What means this path, Simmo ? " 

His keen eyes took in everything at a 
glance, the wavy waterway, the tracks, the yj ' -'-- ^^ ^, 
faint path to the alders. There was a look ipilderness 
of surprise in his face that I had blun- ^ ^/-^ 

dered upon a discovery which he had looked 
for many times in vain, his traps on his 
back. 

" Das a portash," he said simply. 

" A portage ! But who made a portage 
here .? " 

" Well, Musquash he prob'ly make-um 
first. Den beaver, den h'otter, den every- 
body in hurry he make-um. You see, river 
make big bend here. Portash go 'cross ; 
save time, jus' same Indian portash." 

That was the first of a dozen such paths 
that I have since found cutting across the 
bends of wilderness rivers, — the wood folk's 
way of saving time on a journey. I left 
Simmo to go on down the river, while I fol- 
lowed the little byway curiously. There is 
nothing more fascinating in the woods than 
to go on the track of the wild things and see 
what they have been doing. 



156 



But alas ! mine were not the first human 

feet that had taken the journey. Halfway 

^^-»^^-'' yj across, at a point where the path ran over a 

k "^^^^^^^^^ little brook, I found a deadfall set squarely 

^^^ ^ ^^ ii^ the way of unwary feet. It was different 

\ \ ^ % from any I had ever seen, and was made like 

this : 







That tiny stick (trigger, the trappers call 
it) with its end resting in air three inches 
above the bed log — just the right height so 
that a beaver or an otter would naturally put 
his foot on it in crossing — looks innocent 
enough. But if you look sharply you will 



see that if it were pressed down ever so little 

it would instantly release the bent stick that 

holds the fall-log, and bring the deadly thing ^ ' "'■-«,^^ 

down with crushing: force across the back of [^''crerness \ 

^ Byioay ^' 

any animal beneath. ^^ ^ 

Such are the pitfalls that lie athwart the ^'^' ♦* 

way of Keeonekh the otter, when he goes ^ 
a-courting and uses Musquash's portage to 
shorten his journey. 

At the other end of the portage I waited 
for Simmo to come round the bend, and took 
him back to see the work, denouncing the 
heartless carelessness of the trapper who had 
gone aw^ay in the spring and left an unsprung 
deadfall as a menace to the wild things. At 
the first glance he pronounced it an otter 
trap. Then the fear and wonder swept into 
his face, and the questions into mine. 

" Das Noel Waby's trap. Nobody else 
make-um tukpeel stick like dat," he said at 
last. 

Then I understood. Noel Waby had gone 
up river trapping in the spring, and had 
never come back ; nor any word to tell how 
death met him. 






^ I stooped down to examine the trap with 

greater interest. On the underside of the 

^»- y^ fall-log I found some long hairs still clinging 

uJiJderness in the crevices of the rough bark. They 
^ yway ]3giQnge(^ l;o the outer, waterproof coat with 
\ ^ ^. which Keeonekh keeps his fur dry. One 
otter at least had been caught here, and the 
trap reset. But some sense of danger, some 
old scent of blood or subtle warning clung to 
the spot, and no other. creature had crossed 
the bed log, though hundreds must have 
passed that way since the old Indian reset 
his trap, and strode away with the dead otter 
across his shoulders. 

What was it in the air '^, What sense of 
fear brooded here and whispered in the alder 
leaves and tinkled in the brook ? Simmo 
grew uneasy and hurried away. He was like 
the wood folk. But I sat down on a great 
log, which the spring floods had driven in 
through the alders, to feel the meaning of 
the place, if possible, and to have the vast 
. sweet solitude all to myself for a little while. 
A faint stir on my left, and another ! 
Then up the path, twisting and gliding, 



came Keeonekh, the first otter that I had 
ever seen in the wilderness. Where the 
sun flickered in through the alder leaves it 
glinted brightly on the shiny outer hairs of 
his rough coat. As he went his nose worked 
constantly, going far ahead of his bright 
little eyes to tell him what was in the path. 

I was sitting very still, some distance to 
one side, and he did not see me. Near old 
Noel's deadfall he paused an instant with 
raised head, in the curious, snake-like atti- 
tude that all the weasels take when watch- 
ing. Then he glided round the end of the 
trap, and disappeared down the portage. 

When he was gone I stole out to examine 
his tracks. Then I noticed for the first time 
that the old path near the deadfall was get- 
ting moss-grown ; a faint new path began to 
show among the alders. Some warning was 
there in the trap, and with cunning instinct 
all the wood dwellers turned aside, giving a 
wide berth to what they felt was dangerous 
but could not understand. The new path 
joined the old again, beyond the brook, and 
followed it straio^ht to the river. 



159 

XDilderness 




^ Again I examined the deadfall carefully, 

but of course I found nothing. That is a 

^^-»„ -.-^•' -yq matter of instinct, not of eyes and ears; and 

t\ "^^^^^^^^^ it is past finding out. Then I went away for 

5^^ ^ ^ ofood, after driving a rinsf of stout stakes all 

\ \ ^ <^ about the trap to keep heedless little feet 

out of it. But I left it unsprung, just as 

it was, a rude tribute of remembrance to 

Keeonekh and the lost Indian. 



mm<^ 







i6i 



KAGAX THE BLOODTHIRSTY 




^, HIS is the story of 
one day, the last 
one, in the Hfe of Kagax 
the Weasel, who turns 
white in winter, and yellow 
in spring, and brown in sum- 
mer, the better to hide his 
villainy. 

It was early twilight when 
Kagax came out of his den in 
the rocks, under the old pine 
that lightning had blasted. Day and night 
were meeting swiftly but warily, as they 
always meet in the woods. The life of 
the sunshine came stealing nestwards and 
denwards in the peace of a long day and a 
full stomach ; the night life began to stir in 
its coverts, eager, hungry, whining. Deep 

163 




164 
dffHrsfy 



in the wild raspberry thickets a wood thrush 
rang his vesper bell softly; from the moun- 
tain top a night-hawk screamed back an 
answer, and came booming down to earth, 
where the insects were rising in myriads. 
Near the thrush a striped chipmunk sat 
chu7ik-a-chunking his sleepy curiosity at a 
burned log which a bear had just torn open 
for red ants ; while down on the lake shore 
a cautious plash-plash told where a cow 
moose had come out of the alders with her 
calf to sup on the yellow lily roots and sip 
the freshest water. Everywhere life was 
stirring ; everywhere cries, calls, squeaks, 
chirps, rustlings, which only the wood- 
dweller knows how to interpret, broke in 
upon the twilight stillness. 

Kagax grinned and showed all his wicked 
little teeth as the many voices went up from 
lake and stream and forest. " Mine, all mine 
— to kill," he snarled, and his eyes began to 
glow deep red. Then he stretched one sin- 
ewy paw after another, rolled over, climbed 
a tree, and jumped down from a swaying 
twig to get the sleep all out of him. 



i65 




Kagax had slept too much, and was mad 
with the world. The night before, he had 
killed from sunset to sunrise, and much tast- 
ins^ of blood had made him heavy. So he 'S? tw • , 
had slept all day long, only stirrmg once to -^^ ^-- ^^^^ 
kill a partridge that had drummed near his 
den and w^aked him out of sleep. But he 
was too heavy to hunt then, so he crept back 
again, leaving the bird untasted, under the 
end of his own drumming log. Now Kagax 
was eager to make up for lost time; for all 
time is lost to Kagax that is not spent in 
killing. That is why he runs night and day, 
and barely tastes the blood of his victims, 
and sleeps only an hour or two of cat naps 
at a time — just long enough to gather 
energy for more evil doing. 

As he stretched himself again, a sudden 
barking and snickering came from a giant 
spruce on the hill above. Meeko the red 
squirrel had discovered a new jay's nest and 
was making a sensation over it, as he does 
over everything that he has not happened to 
see before. Had he known who was listen- 
ing, he would have risked his neck in a 



i66 



^, 












headlong rush for safety; for all the wild 
things fear Kagax as they fear death. But 
no wild thing ever knows till too late that 
a weasel is near. 

Kagax listened a moment, a ferocious grin 
on his pointed face; then he stole towards 
the sound. " I intended to kill those young 
hares first," he thought, " but this fool squir- 
rel will stretch my legs better, and point my 
nose, and get the sleep out of me — There 
he is, in the big spruce ! " 

Kagax had not seen the squirrel, but that 
did not matter ; he can locate a victim better 
with his nose or ears than he can with his 
eyes. The moment he was sure of the place, 
he rushed forward without caution. Meeko 
was in the midst of a prolonged snicker at 
the scolding jays, w^hen he heard a scratch 
on the bark below, turned, looked down, and 
fled with a cry of terror. Kagax was already 
halfway up the tree, the red fire blazing in 
his eyes. 

The squirrel rushed to the end of a branch, 
jumped to a smaller spruce, ran that up to 
the top; then, because his fright had made 



him forget the tree paths that ordinarily he ^ 

knew very well, he sprang out and down to 

the ground, a clear fifty feet, breaking his Kadax 

fall bv catching and holding^ for an instant a 'Qf up - , 

/ ^^ ^ Dloodmirstyf 

swaying fir tip on the way. Ihen he rushed ""^ "- ■ ""^ 

pell-mell over logs and rocks, and through <f^<'l^l/^7^ 

the underbrush to a maple, and from that ' "-^"^ ' 

across a dozen trees to another giant spruce, 

where he ran up and down desperately over 

half the branches, crossing and crisscrossing 

his trail, and dropped panting at last into a 

little crevice under a broken limb. There 

he crouched into the smallest possible space 

and w^atched, with an awful fear in his eyes, 

the rough trunk below. 

Far behind him came Kagax, grim, relent- 
less, silent as death. He paid no attention 
to scratching claws nor swaying branches, 
never looking for the jerking red tip of 
Meeko's tail, nor listening for the loud thump 
of his feet when he struck the ground. A 
pair of brave little flycatchers saw the chase 
and rushed at the common enemy, striking 
him with their beaks, and raising an outcry 
that brought a score of frightened, clamoring 



1 68 



birds to the scene. But Kagax never heeded. 
His whole being seemed to be concentrated 
J"(j^s^^#// in the point of his nose. He followed like a 

^^"^X ^ffie bloodhound to the top of the second spruce, 
ll^Woodffiirsfy sniffed here and there till he caught the 
'{ scent of Meeko's passage through the air, 

ran to the end of a branch in the same direc- 
tion and leaped to the ground, landing not 
ten feet from the spot where the squirrel had 
struck a moment before. There he picked 
up the trail, followed over logs and rocks to 
the maple, up to the third branch, and across 
fifty yards of intervening branches to the 
giant spruce, where his victim sat half para- 
lyzed, watching from his crevice. 

Here Kagax was more deliberate. Left 
and right, up and down he went with deadly 
patience, from the lowest branch to the top, 
a hundred feet above, following every cross 
and winding of the trail. A dozen times he 
stopped, went back, picked up the fresher 
trail, and went on again. A dozen times he 
passed within a few feet of his victim, smell- 
ing him strongly, but scorning to use his 
eyes till his nose had done its perfect work. 



169 




H"4 



■Mz: 



So he came to the last turn, followed the 
last branch, his nose to the bark, straight to 
the crevice under the broken branch, where 
Meeko crouched shiverino-, knowinor it was ^^ ,,^ . 

There was a cry, that no one heeded in 
the woods ; there was a flash of sharp teeth, 
and the squirrel fell, striking the ground 
with a heavy thump. Kagax ran down 
the trunk, sniffed an instant at the body 
without touching it, and darted away to 
the form among the ferns. He had passed 
it at daylight when he was too heavy for 
killing. 

Halfway to the lake he stopped ; a thrill- 
ing song from a dead spruce top bubbled 
out over the darkening woods. When a 
hermit thrush sings like that, his nest is 
somewhere just below. Kagax began twist- 
ing in and out like a snake among the 
bushes, till a stir in a tangle of raspberry 
vines, which no ears but his or an owl's 
would ever notice, made him shrink close 
to the ground and look up. The red fire 
blazed in his eyes again ; for there was 




Mother Thrush just settling upon her nest, 
not five feet from his head. 
>^V ^ '^^ climb the raspberry vines without 

^K ^e shaking them, and so alarming the bird, 
drnrrsfy ^^g out of the question ; but there was a 
fire-blasted tree just behind. Kagax climbed 
it stealthily on the side away from the bird, 
crept to a branch over the nest, and leaped 
down. Mother Thrush was preening her- 
self sleepily, feeling the grateful warmth of 
her eggs and listening to the wonderful song 
overhead, when the blow came — and the 
pretty nest would never again wait for a 
brooding mother in the twilight. 

All the while the wonderful song went 
on ; for the hermit thrush, pouring his soul 
out, far above on the dead spruce top, heard 
not a sound of the tragedy below. 

Kagax flung the warm body aside savagely, 
bit through the ends of the three eggs, wish- 
ing they were young thrushes, and leaped to 
the ground. There he just tasted the brain 
of his victim to whet his appetite, listened 
a moment, crouching among the dead leaves, 
to the melody overhead, wishing it were 



171 



darker, so that the hermit would come down 
and he could end his barbarous work. Then 
he glided away to the young hares. Kadax 



There were five of them in the form, 



the 

hidden among the coarse brakes of a little j/^^^^'^^f^f/-" iW^'^- 

opening. Kagax went straight to the spot. ^ ^^ ^f7vr'A_3p^. 

A weasel never forgets. He killed them all, 

one after another, slowly, deliberately, by a 

single bite through the spine, tasting only 

the blood of the last one. Then he wriggled 

down among the warm bodies and waited, 

his nose to the path by which Mother Hare 

had gone away. He knew well that she would 

soon be coming back. 

Presently he heard her, put-a-put, put-a- 
put, hopping along the path, with a waving 
line of ferns to show just where she was. 
Kagax wriggled lower among his helpless 
victims ; his eyes blazed red again, so red 
that Mother Hare saw them and stopped 
short. Then Kagax sat up straight among 
the dead babies and screeched in her face. 

The poor creature never moved a step ; 
she only crouched low before her own door 
and began to shiver violently. Kagax ran 



!, '/. 




172 



"^Ka^ax 



up to her ; raised himself on his hind legs 

so as to place his fore paws on her neck ; 

chose his favorite spot behind the ears, and 

^'^ bit. The hare straightened out, the quiver- 



Ifmoodfhirsfy ing ceased. A tiny drop of blood followed 
■\ the sharp teeth on either side. Kagax licked 

it greedily and hurried away, afraid to spoil 
his hunt by drinking. 

But he had scarcely entered the woods, 
running heedlessly, when the moss by a 
great stone stirred with a swift motion. 
There was a squeak of fright as Kagax 
jumped forward like lightning — but too 
late. Tookhees the timid little wood 
mouse, who was digging under the moss 
for twin-flower roots to feed his little ones, 
had heard the enemy coming, and dived 
headlong into his hole, just in time to escape 
the snap of Kagax's teeth. 

That angered the fiery little weasel like 
poking a stick at him. To be caught nap- 
ping, or to be heard running through the 
woods, is more than he can possibly stand. 
His eyes fairly snapped as he began digging 
furiously. Below, he could hear a chorus of 



faint squeaks, the clamor of young wood 
mice for their supper. But a few inches 
down, and the hole doubled under a round 
stone, then vanished between two roots close 
together. Try as he would, Kagax could 
only wear his claws out, without making any 
progress. He tried to force his shoulders 
through ; for a weasel thinks he can go any- 
where. But the hole was too small. Kagax 
cried out in rage and took up the trail. A 
dozen times he ran it from the hole to the 
torn moss, where Tookhees had been digging 
roots, and back again ; then, sure that all the 
wood mice were inside, he tried to tear his 
way between the obstinate roots. As well 
try to claw down the tree itself. 

All the while Tookhees, who always has 
just such a turn in his tunnel, and who knows 
perfectly when he is safe, crouched just below 
the roots, looking up with steady little eyes, 
like two black beads, at his savage pursuer, 
and listening in a kind of dumb terror to his 
snarls of rage. 

Kagax gave it up at last and took to run- 
ning in circles. Wider and wider he went. 



173 
Kadax 

me 

B/oodfhirsfy^ 





174 



ax 



running swift and silent, his nose to the 
ground, seeking other mice on whom to 
wreak his vengeance. Suddenly he struck a 
^j^ fresh trail and ran it straight to the clearing, 
loodthirsfy where a foolish field mouse had built a nest 
in a tangle of dry brakes. Kagax caught 
and killed the mother as she rushed out in 
alarm. Then he tore the nest open and 
killed all the little ones. He tasted the 
blood of one and went on again. 

The failure to catch the wood mouse still 
rankled in his head and kept his eyes bright 
red. Abruptly he turned from his course 
along the lake shore; he began to climb the 
ridge. Up and up he went, crossing a dozen 
trails that ordinarily he would have followed, 
till he came to where a dead tree had fallen 
and lodged against a big spruce, near the 
summit. There he crouched in the under- 
brush and waited. 

Near the top of the dead tree a pair of 
pine martens had made their den in the hol- 
low trunk, and reared a family of young mar- 
tens that drew Kagax's evil thoughts like a 
magnet. The marten belongs to the weasel's 



own family; therefore, as a choice bit of 
revenge, Kagax would rather kill him than 
anything else. A score of times he had 
crouched in this same place and waited for 
his chance. But the marten is larger and 
stronger every way than the weasel and, 
though shyer, almost as savage in a fight. 
And Kagax was afraid. 

But to-night Kagax was in a more vicious 
mood than ever before ; and a weasel's tem- 
per is always the most vicious thing in the 
woods. He stole forward at last and put his 
nose to the foot of the leaning tree. Two fresh 
trails went out ; none came back. Kagax fol- 
lowed them far enough to be sure that both 
martens were away hunting; then he turned 
and ran like a flash up the incline and into 
the den. 

In a moment he came out, licking his 
chops greedily. Inside, the young martens 
lay just as they had been left by the mother; 
only they began to grow very cold. Kagax 
ran to the great spruce, along a branch into 
another tree ; then to the ground by a dizzy 
jump. There he ran swiftly for a good half 



175 
Kadax 

me 



3/0 odfhirsfym? 




176 



hour in a long diagonal down towards the 




Kadax 



I ''f:. 



lake, crisscrossing his trail here and there as 
he ran. 

Once more his night's hunting began, with 
dfhirsiy greater zeal than before. He was hungry 
now ; his nose grew keen as a brier for every 
trail. A faint smell stopped him, so faint 
that the keenest-nosed dog or fox would have 
passed without turning, — the smell of a 
brooding partridge on her eggs. There she 
was, among the roots of a pine, sitting close 
and blending perfectly with the roots and 
the brown needles. Kagax moved like a 
shadow ; his nose found the bird ; before 
she could spring he was on her back, and 
his teeth had done their evil work. Once 
more he tasted the fresh brains with keen 
relish. He broke all the eggs, so that none 
else might profit by his hunting, and went 
on again. 

On some moist ground, under a hemlock, 
he came upon the fresh trail of a wandering 
hare — no simple, unsuspecting mother com- 
ing back to her babies, but a big, strong, sus- 
picious fellow, who knew how to make a run 




for his life. Kagax was still fresh and eager ; 
here was game that would stretch his mus- 
cles. The red lust of killing flamed into his 
eyes as he jumped away on the trail. 

Soon, by the long distances between tracks, 
he knew^ that the hare was startled. The 
scent was fresher now, so fresh that he could 
follow it in the air, without putting his nose 
to the ground. 

Suddenly a great commotion sounded 
among the bushes just ahead, where a mo- 
ment before all was still. The hare had been 
lying there, watching his back track to see 
what was following. When he saw the red 
eyes of Kagax, he darted away wildly. A 
few hundred yards, and the foolish hare, who 
could run far faster than his pursuer, dropped 
in the bushes again to watch and see if the 
weasel were still after him. 

Kagax was following swiftly, silently. 
Again the hare bounded away, only to stop 
and scare himself into fits by watching his 
own trail till the red eyes of the weasel 
blazed into view. So it went on for a half- 
hour, through brush and brake and swamp, 



177 
Kadax 

me 



3/0 odthirsfyf. 




P, till the hare had lost all his wits and began 
to run wildly in small circles. Then Kagax 
i..=.«s3»enf z>- turned, ran the back track a little way, and 



Ihe crouched flat on the ground. 
'ooarnirsfy Jn a moment the hare came tearing along 
i on his own trail — straight towards the 

yellow-brown ball under a fern tip. Kagax 
waited till he was almost run over; then he 
sprang up and screeched. That ended the 
chase. The hare just dropped on his fore 
paws. Kagax jumped for his head; his 
teeth met; the hunger began to gnaw, and 
he drank his fill greedily. 

For a time the madness of the chase 
increased within him. Keener than ever to 
kill, he darted away on a fresh trail. But 
soon his feast began to tell; his feet grew 
heavy. Angry at himself, he lay down to 
sleep their weight away. 

Far behind him, under the pine by the 
partridge's nest, a long dark shadow seemed 
to glide over the ground. A pointed nose 
touched the leaves here and there ; over the 
nose a pair of fierce little eyes glowed deep 
red as Kagax's own. So the shadow came 



179 




to the partridge's nest, passed over it, mind- 
ing not the scent of broken eggs nor of the 
dead bird, but only the scent of the weasel, Jiadax 

and vanished into the underbrush on the f^^ ^ . 
., 3/ooc/jn/rsfy% 

Kagax woke with a start and ran on. A 
big bullfrog croaked down on the shore. 
Kagax stalked and killed him, leaving his 
carcass untouched among the lily pads. A 
dead pine in a thicket attracted his suspicion. 
He climbed it swiftly, found a fresh round 
hole, and tumbled in upon a mother bird and 
a family of young woodpeckers. He killed 
them all, and hunted the tree over for the 
father bird, the great black logcock that 
makes the wilderness ring with his tattoo. 
But the logcock heard claws on the bark and 
flew to another tree, making a great commo- 
tion in the darkness as he blundered along, 
but not knowing what it was that had 
startled him. 

So the night wore on, with Kagax killing 
in every thicket, yet never satisfied with 
killing. He thought longingly of the hard 
winter, when game was scarce and he had 




^ made his way out over the snow to the set- 
tlement, and hved among the chicken coops. 
„,,, "Twenty bis^ hens in one roost — that was 

^^^ ffie killing'" snarled Kagax savagely, as he 
dfhirsfy strangled two young herons in their nest, 
while the mother bird went on with her 
frogging, not ten yards away among the lily 
pads, and never heard a rustle. 

Toward morning he turned homeward, 
making his way back in a circle along the 
top of the ridge where his den was, and 
killing as he went. He had tasted too 
much; his feet grew heavier than they had 
ever been before. He thought angrily that 
he would have to sleep another whole day. 
And to sleep a whole day, while the wilder- 
ness was just beginning to swarm with life, 
filled Kagax with snarling rage. 

A mother hare darted away from her form 
as the weasel's wicked eyes looked in upon 
her. Kagax killed the little ones and had 
started after the mother, when a shiver 
passed over him and he turned back to 
listen. He had been moving more slowly of 
late; several times he had looked behind 



I8I 



him with the feehng that he was followed. 
He stole back to the hare's form and lay 
hidden, watching his back track. He shiv- Kadax 
ered again. " If it were not stronger than I, -^^ 
it would not follow my trail," thought Kagax. 
The fear of a hunted thing came upon him. 
He remembered the marten's den, the stran- 
gled young ones, the two trails that left the 
leaning tree. " They must have turned back 
long ago," thought Kagax, and darted away. 
His back was cold now, cold as ice. 

But his feet grew very heavy ere he 
reached his den. A faint light began to 
show over the mountain across the lake. 
Killooleet, the white-throated sparrow, saw 
it, and his clear morning song tinkled out of 
the dark underbrush. Kagax's eyes glowed 
red again ; he stole toward the sound for 
a last kill. Young sparrows' brains are a 
dainty dish ; he would eat his fill, since he 
must sleep all day. He found the nest; he 
had placed his fore paws against the tree 
that held it, w^hen he dropped suddenly ; the 
shivers began to course all over him. Just 
below, from a stub in a dark thicket, a deep 






^ Whooo-hoo-hoo ! rolled out over the startled 

woods. 

jy , It was Kookooskoos, the s^reat horned owl, 

nadax . „ , . ^. . 

^ ^^e ^^^^ generally hunts only m the evening 



'oodfhirsfy twilight, but who, with growing young ones 
1 to feed, sometimes uses the morning twilight 

as well. Kagax lay still as a stone. Over 
him the sparrows, knowing the danger, 
crouched low in their nest, not daring to 
move a claw lest the owl should hear. 

Behind him the same shadow that had 
passed over the partridge's nest looked into 
the hare's form with fierce red eyes. It fol- 
lowed Kagax's trail over that of the mother 
hare, turned back, sniffed the earth, and 
came hurrying silently along the ridge. 

Kagax crept stealthily out of the thicket. 
He had an awful fear now of his feet; for, 
heavy with the blood he had eaten, they 
would rustle the leaves, or scratch on the 
stones, that all night long they had glided 
over in silence ; and the owl hears everything. 
He was near his den now. He could see the 
old pine that lightning had blasted, towering 
against the sky over the dark spruces. 




\vo sets of strong curved claws dropped down fronn the shadow 



Again the deep Whooo-hoo-hoo ! rolled ^ 
over the hillside. To Kagax, who gloats 

over his killing except when he is afraid, Kadax 

it became an awful accusation. " Who has ^^ ,^ . 

killed where he cannot eat .^^ who strang^led ..^^'^rri ^ rl^ 

a brooding bird ? who murdered his own S^Mj^ I 



kin ? " came thundering through the woods. 
Kagax darted for his den. His hind feet 
struck a rotten twig that they should have 
cleared ; it broke with a sharp snap. In an 
instant a huge shadow swept down from the 
stub and hovered over the sound. Two 
fierce yellow eyes looked in upon Kagax, 
crouching and trying to hide under a fir tip. 

Kagax whirled when the eyes found him 
and two sets of strong curved claws dropped 
down from the shadow. With a savage snarl 
he sprang up, and his teeth met; but no 
blood followed the bite, only a flutter of soft 
brown feathers. Then one set of sharp claws 
gripped his head ; another set met deep in 
his back. Kagax was jerked swiftly into the 
air, and his evil doing was ended forever. 

There was a faint rustle in the thicket as 
the shadow of Kookooskoos swept away to 



r> his nest. The long lithe form of a pine 

marten glided straight to the fir tip, where 

^i^K H Kagax had been a moment before. His 

fp^^%\ ^ffy^ movements were quick, nervous, silent; his 
(oocfm/rsry gy^g glowed like two rubies over his twitch- 
ing nostrils. He circled swiftly about the 
end of the lost trail. His nose touched a 
brown feather, another, and he glided back 
to the fir tip. A drop of blood was soaking 
slowly into a dead leaf. The marten thrust 
his nose into it. One long sniff, while his 
eyes blazed ; then he raised his head, cried 
out once savagely, and glided away on the 
back track. 




i85 



MOOSE CALLING 




IDNIGHT in the wilder- 
ness. The belated 
moon wheels slowly 
above the eastern ridge, 
where for a few minutes 
past a mighty pine and 
hundreds of pointed 
spruce tops have been standing out in inky 
blackness against the gray and brightening 
background. The silver light steals swiftly 
down the evergreen tops, sending long black 
shadows creeping before it, and falls glisten- 
ing and shimmering across the sleeping 
waters of a forest lake. No ripple breaks 
its polished surface ; no plash of musquash 
or leaping trout sends its vibrations up into 
the still, frosty air ; no sound of beast or 
bird awakens the echoes of the silent forest. 

Nature seems dying, her life frozen out of 

187 




Tfoose 



^^ her by the chill of the October night ; and 
no voice tells of her suffering. 

A moment ago the little lake lay all black 
and uniform, like a great well among the 
hills, with only glimmering star-points to 



Callind reveal its surface. Now, down in a bay 
below a grassy point, where the dark shadows 
of the eastern shore reach almost across, a 
dark object is lying silent and motionless on 
the lake. Its side seems gray and uncer- 
tain above the water ; at either end is a dark 
mass, that in the increasing light takes the 
form of human head and shoulders. A bark 
canoe with two occupants is before us ; but 
so still, so lifeless apparently, that till now 
we thought it part of the shore beyond. 

There is a movement in the stern ; the 
profound stillness is suddenly broken by 
a frightful roar : M-wah-uh ! M-waah-uh ! 
M-w-wa^a-a-d^a ! The echoes rouse them- 
selves swiftly, and rush away confused and 
broken, to and fro across the lake. As they 
die away among the hills there is a sound 
from the canoe as if an animal were walking 
in shallow water, splash, splash, splash, klop I 



then silence ao^ain, that is not dead, but 



hstening. 



189 



A half-hour passes ; but not for an instant ^^oose Ca/Iind 



does the listening tension of the lake relax. 
Then the loud bellow rings out again, start- 
ling us and the echoes, though we were 
listening for it. This time the tension in- 
creases an hundredfold ; every nerve is 
strained ; every muscle ready. Hardly have 
the echoes been lost when, from far up the 
ridges, comes an ugly roar that penetrates 
the woods like a rifle-shot. Again it comes, 
and nearer ! Down in the canoe a paddle 
blade touches the water noiselessly from the 
stern ; and over the bow there is the glint 
of moonlight on a rifle barrel. The roar is 
now continuous on the summit of the last 
low ridge. Twigs crackle, and branches 
snap. There is the thrashing of mighty 
antlers among the underbrush, the pounding 
of heavy hoofs upon the earth ; and straight 
down the great bull rushes like a tempest, 
nearer, nearer, till he bursts with tremendous 
crash through the last fringe of alders out 
upon the grassy point. — And then the heavy 





boom of a rifle rolling^ across the startled 
'^° lake. 

Such is moose calling. 

The call of the cow moose, which the 
.j^ --^ss^^?|— ^ hunter always uses at first, is an explosive 
Cal/ind bellow, quite impossible to describe accu- 
rately. Before ever hearing it, I had fre- 
quently asked Indians and hunters what it 
was like. The answers were rather unsat- 
isfactory. " Like a tree falling," said one. 
" Like the sudden swell of a cataract at 
night," said another. " Like a rifle-shot, or 
a man shouting hoarsely," said a third; and 
so on, till like a menagerie at feeding time 
was my idea of it. 

One night, as I sat with my friend at the 
door of our bark tent, eating our belated sup-- 
per in tired silence, while the rush of the 
salmon pool near and the sigh of the night 
wind in the spruces were lulling us to sleep 
as we ate, a sound suddenly filled the forest, 
and was gone. Strangely enough, we pro- 
nounced the word moose together, though 
neither of us had ever heard the sound be- 
fore. ' Like a gun in a fog ' would describe 



IQI 




the sound to me better than anything else; 

though after hearing it many times the simile 

is not at all accurate. This first indefinite Moose Callind 

sound is heard early in the season. Later it 

is prolonged and more definite, as I have 

given it. 

The answer of the bull varies but little. 
It is a short, hoarse, grunting roar, frightfully 
ugly when close at hand, and leaving no 
doubt as to the mood he is in. Sometimes, 
when a bull is shy and the hunter thinks he 
is near and listening, though no sound gives 
any idea of his whereabouts, he follows the 
bellow of the cow by the short roar of the 
bull, at the same time snapping the sticks 
under his feet, and thrashing the bushes with 
a club. Then, if the bull answers, look out. 
Jealous, and fighting mad, he hurls himself 
out of his concealment and rushes straight 
in to meet his rival. Once aroused in this 
way he heeds no danger, and the eye must 
be clear and the muscles steady to stop him 
surely ere he reaches the thicket where the 
hunter is concealed. 

The trumpet with which the calling is 



192 



Tfoose 




done is a piece 01 birch bark, rolled up cone- 
shape, with the smooth side within. It is 
fifteen or sixteen inches long, about five 
inches in diameter at the larger, and one 

inch at the smaller end. The right hand is 

Callind folded round the smaller end for a mouth- 
piece; into this the caller grunts and roars 
and bellows, at the same time swinging the 
trumpet's mouth in sweeping curves to imi- 
tate the peculiar quaver of the cow's call. If 
the bull is near and suspicious, the sound is 
deadened by holding the mouth of the trum- 
pet close to the ground. This, to me, imi- 
tates the real sound more accurately than 
any other attempt. 

So many conditions must be met at once 
for successful calling, and so warily does a ~ 
bull approach, that the chances are always 
strongly against the hunter's seeing his game. 
The old bulls are shy from much hunting ; 
the younger ones fear the wrath of an older 
rival. It is only once in a lifetime, and far 
back from civilization where the moose have 
not been hunted, that one's call is swiftly 
answered by a savage old bull that knows no 





fear. Here one is never sure what response 
his call will bring; and the spice of excite- 
ment, and perhaps danger, is added to the Moose Callind 
sport. 

In illustration of the uncertainty of calling, 
the writer recalls with considerable pride his 
first attempt, which was somewhat startling 
in its success. It was on a lake, far back from 
the settlements, in northern New Brunswick. 
One evening, while returning from fishing, I 
heard the bellow of a cow moose on a hard- 
wood ridge above me. Along the base of 
the ridge stretched a bay with grassy shores, 
very narrow where it entered the lake, but 
broadening out to fifty yards across, and 
reaching back half a mile to meet a cold 
stream that came down from a smaller lake 
among the hills. All this I noted carefully 
while gliding past; for it struck me as an 
ideal place for moose calling, if one were 
hunting. 

The next evening, while fishing alone in 
the stream, I heard the moose again, on the 
same ridge, and in a sudden spirit of curi- 
osity determined to try the effect of a roar 




or two on her, in imitation of an old bull. I 
194 

had never heard of a cow answering the call ; 

and I had no suspicion then that the bull 

was anywhere near. I was not an expert 

-^ .-^.^^^,^. caller. Under tuition of my Indian I had 
noose " . , , . "^ .„ , 

Ca//ind practised two or three times, till he told me, 

with charming frankness, that possibly a man 
might mistake me for a moose, if he had not 
heard one very often. Here was a chance 
for more practice and a bit of variety. If it 
frightened the moose it would do no harm, 
as we were not hunting. 

Running the canoe ashore, below where 
the moose had called, I peeled the bark from 
a young birch, rolled it into a trumpet and, 
standing on the grassy bank, uttered the 
deep grunt of a bull two or three times in 
quick succession. The effect was tremen- 
dous. From the summit of the ridge, not 
two hundred yards above where I stood, the 
angry challenge of a bull was hurled down 
upon me out of the woods. Then it seemed 
as if a steam engine were crashing full speed 
through the underbrush. In fewer seconds 
than it takes to write it, the canoe was well 




Possibly a man might mistake me for a moose 



195 




out into deep water, lying motionless with 
the bow inshore. A moment later a huge 
bull plunged through the fringe of alders Moose Callind 
to the open bank, gritting his teeth, grunt- 
ing, chocking, stamping the earth savagely, 
and thrashing the bushes with his great 
antlers — as ugly a picture as one would care 
to see in the woods. 

He seemed bewildered at not seeing his 
rival, ran swiftly along the bank, turned and 
came swinging back again, all the while 
uttering his hoarse challenge. Then the 
canoe swung in the slight current; in get- 
ting control of it again the movement at- 
tracted his attention, and he saw me for the 
first time. In a moment he was down the 
bank into shallow water, striking with his 
hoofs and tossing his huge head up and 
down like an angry bull. Fortunately the 
water was deep, and he did not try to swim 
out ; for there was not a weapon of any kind 
in the canoe. 

When I started down towards the lake, 
after baiting the bull's fury awhile by shak- 
ing the paddle and splashing water at him, 



196 




he followed me along the bank, keeping up 
his threatening demonstrations. Down near 
the lake he plunged suddenly ahead before 
I realized the danger, splashed out into the 

-.^ -:c_^^^*i~^ narrow opening in front of the canoe — and 

^""""Cl//,;^ there I was, trapped. 

It was dark when I at last got out of it. 
To get by the ugly beast in that narrow 
opening was out of the question, as I found 
out after a half -hour's trying. Just at dusk 
I turned the canoe and paddled slowly back; 
and the moose, leaving his post, followed as 
before along the bank. At the upper side 
of a little bay I paddled close up to shore, 
and waited till he ran round, almost up to 
me, before backing out into deep water. 
Splashing seemed to madden the brute, so 
I splashed him, till in his fury he waded out 
deeper and deeper, to strike the exasperat- 
ing canoe with his antlers. When he would 
follow no further, I swung the canoe sud- 
denly and headed for the opening at a 
racing stroke. I had a fair start before he 
understood the trick; but I never turned to 
see how he made the bank and circled the 



197 




little bay. The splash and plunge of hoofs 

was fearfully close behind me as the canoe 

shot through the opening ; and as the little Moose Cal/ind 

bark swung round on the open waters of the '" ^ 

lake, for a final splash and flourish of the 

paddle, and a yell or two of derision, there 

stood the bull in the inlet, still thrashing his 

antlers and chocking his teeth ; and there I 

left him. 

The season of calling is a short one, 
beginning early in September and lasting 
till the middle of October. Occasionally a 
bull will answer as late as November, but 
this is unusual. In this season a perfectly 
still night is the first requisite. The bull, 
when he hears the call, will often approach 
without making a sound. It is simply won- 
derful how. still the great brute can be as he 
moves slowly through the woods. Then he 
makes a circuit, till he has gone completely 
round the spot where he heard the call ; and 
if there is the slightest breeze blowing he 
scents the danger and is off on the instant. 



On a still night his big trumpet-shaped 
ears are marvelously acute. Only absolute 





^ silence on the hunter's part can insure 
success. 

Another condition quite as essential is 
moonlight. The moose sometimes calls just 
.-^..^^^-^^; before dusk and just before sunrise; but the 
Callind bull is more wary at such times, and very 
loth to show himself in the open. Night 
diminishes his extreme caution and, unless 
he has been hunted, he responds more 
readily. Only a bright moonlight can give 
any accuracy to a rifle-shot. To attempt it 
by starlight would result simply in fright- 
ening the game, or possibly running into 
danger. 

By far the best place for calling, if one is 
in a moose country, is from a canoe on some 
quiet lake or river. A spot is selected mid- 
way between two open shores, near together 
if possible. On whichever side the bull 
answers, the canoe is backed silently away 
into the shadow against the opposite bank ; 
and there the hunters crouch, motionless till 
their game shows himself clearly in the 
moonlight on the open shore. 

If there is no water in the immediate 




vicinity of the hunting ground, then a thicket 
in the midst of an open spot is the place to 
call. Such spots are found only about the Moose Callind 
barrens, which are treeless plains scattered " '' 

here and there throughout the great northern 
wilderness. The scattered thickets on such 
plains are, without doubt, the islands of the 
ancient lakes that once covered them. Here 
the hunter collects a warm nest of dry moss 
and fir tips at sundown, and spreads the thick 
blanket that he has brought on his back all the 
weary way from camp ; for without it the cold 
of the autumn night would be unendurable to 
one who can neither light a fire nor move 
about to get warm. When a bull answers a 
call from such a spot he will generally circle 
the barren, just within the edge of the sur- 
rounding forest, and unless enraged by 
jealousy will seldom venture far out into the 
open. This fearfulness of the open charac- 
terizes the moose in all places and seasons. 
He is a creature of the forest, never at ease 
unless within quick reach of its protection. 

An exciting incident happened to Mitchell, 
my Indian guide, one autumn, while hunting 



on one of these barrens with a sportsman 
200 . . ^ 

whom he was guiding. He was moose call- 
ing, one night, from a thicket near the middle 
of a barren. No answer came to his repeated 
-i^^^^^ call, though he felt quite sure that a bull 
CaHind was near, somewhere within the dark fringe 
of forest. He was about to try the roar of 
the bull, when it suddenly burst out of the 
woods behind them, in exactly the opposite 
quarter from that in which they believed 
• their game was concealed. Scarcely had the 
echoes answered when, in front of them, a 
second challenge sounded sharp and fierce; 
and they saw, directly across the open, the 
underbrush at the forest's edge sway vio- 
lently, as the bull they had long suspected 
broke out in a towering rage. He was slow- 
in advancing, however, and Mitchell glided 
rapidly across the thicket, whither, a moment 
later, his excited hiss called his companion. 
From the opposite fringe of forest the second 
bull had hurled himself out, and was plung- 
ing straight towards them. 

Crouching low among the firs they awaited 
his headlong rush ; not without many a 



20I 




startled glance backward, and a very uncom- 
fortable sense of being trapped and fright- 
ened, as Mitchell confessed to me afterward. Moose Callind 
He had left his gun in camp; his employer 
had insisted upon it, in his eagerness to kill 
the moose himself. 

The bull came rapidly within rifle-shot. 
In a minute more he would be within their 
hiding place ; the rifle sight was trying to 
cover a vital spot, when, right behind them 
— at the thicket's edge, it seemed — a fright- 
ful roar and a furious pounding of hoofs 
brought them to their feet with a bound. A 
second later the rifle was lying among the 
bushes, and a panic-stricken hunter was 
scratching and smashing in a desperate hurry 
up among the branches of a low spruce, as 
if only the tip-top were half high enough. 
Mitchell was nowhere to be seen ; unless one 
had the eyes of an owl to find him down 
among the roots of a fallen pine. 

But the first moose smashed straight 
through the thicket, without looking up or 
down ; and out on the open barren a tremen- 
dous struggle began. There was a minute's 



202 



TJi 




oose 




confused uproar, of savage grunts and 
clashing antlers and hoarse, labored breath- 
ing; then the excitement of the fight was 
too strong to be resisted; a dark form 
wriggled out from among the roots, only to 
Cal/ind stretch itself flat under a bush and peer 
cautiously at the struggling brutes, not 
thirty feet away. Twice Mitchell hissed 
for his employer to come down; but that 
worthy was safe astride the highest branch 
that would bear his weight, with no desire 
evidently for a better view of the fight. 
Then Mitchell found the rifle among the 
bushes and, waiting till the bulls backed 
away for one of their furious charges, killed 
W^^'^i the larger one in his tracks. The second 
stood startled an instant, with raised head 
and quivering muscles, then dashed away 
across the barren and into the forest. 

Such encounters are often numbered 
among the tragedies of the great wilder- 
ness. In tramping through the woods one 
sometimes comes upon two sets of huge 
antlers locked firmly together, and white 
bones, picked clean by hungry prowlers. 



^ 



7 /f 



203 




It needs no written record to tell their 
story. 

Once I saw a duel that resulted differently, j^oose Ca/find 
I heard a terrific uproar, and crept through 
the woods, thinking to have a savage wilder- 
ness spectacle all to myself. Two young 
bulls were fighting desperately in an open 
glade, without any cause for fighting that I 
could discover — except, perhaps, that both 
were immensely strong and over-proud of 
their first big horns. 

But I was not alone, as I expected. A 
great flock of crossbills swooped down into 
the spruces, and stopped whistling in their 
astonishment. A dozen red squirrels snick- 
ered and barked their approval, as the bulls 
butted each other. Meeko is always glad 
when mischief is afoot. High overhead 
floated a rare woods' raven, his head bent 
sharply downward to see. Moose-birds 
flitted in restless excitement from tree to 
bush. Kagax the weasel postponed his 
bloodthirsty errand to the young rabbits. 
And just beside me, under the fir tips, 
Tookhees the wood mouse forgot his fear 



204 



Tfoose 



of the owl and the fox and his hundred 
enemies, and sat by his den in broad day- 
hght, rubbing his whiskers nervously. 

So we watched, till the bull that was get- 
ting the worst of it backed near me, and got 
Cal/ind my wind, and the fight was over. 





205 



THE BUILDERS 




CURIOUS bit of wild life came 

to me at dusk, one day, in the 

wilderness. It was midwinter, 

and the snow lay deep. I 

was sitting alone on a 

fallen tree, waiting for the 

moon to rise, so that I 

could follow the faint 

snowshoe trail to camp. I had followed a 

caribou too far that day, and this was the 

result — feeling along my own track by 

moonlight, with the thermometer sinking 

rapidly to the twenty-below-zero point. 

There is scarcely any twilight in the 

woods; in ten minutes it would be quite 

dark ; and I was wishing that I had blankets 

and an axe, so that I could camp where I 

was, when a gray shadow came stealing 

towards me through the trees. It was a 

207 




^^ Canada lynx. My fingers gripped the rifle 
hard, and the right mitten seemed to slip off 
Tfie ^ui/ders ^^ itself as I caught the glare of his fierce 
yellow eyes. 

But the eyes were not looking at me at all. 
Indeed the lynx had not noticed me. He 
was stealing along, crouched low in the snow, 
his ears back, his stub tail twitching ner- 
vously, his whole attention fixed tensely on 
something beyond me, out on the barren. I 
wanted his beautiful skin ; but I wanted more 
to find out what he was after; so I kept still 
and watched. 

At the edge of the barren he crouched 
under a dwarf spruce, settled himself deeper 
in the snow by a wriggle or two till his feet 
were well under him and his balance perfect, 
and the red fire blazed in his eyes and his 
big muscles quivered. Then he hurled him- 
self forward — one, two, a dozen bounds 
through flying snow, and he landed with 
a screech on the dome of a beaver house. 
There he jumped about, shaking an imagi- 
nary beaver like a fury, and gave another 
screech that made one's spine tingle. That 



over, he stood very still, looking off over the 
beaver roofs that dotted the shore of a little 
pond there. The blaze died out of his eyes ; 
a different look crept into them. He put his 
nose down to a tiny hole in the mound, the 
beavers' ventilator, and took a long sniff, 
while his whole body seemed to distend with 
the warm rich odor that poured up into his 
hungry nostrils. Then he rolled his head 
sadly, and went away. 

Now all that was pure acting. A lynx 
likes beaver meat better than anything else; 
and this fellow had caught some of the col- 
cny, no doubt, in the well-fed autumn days, 
as they worked on their dam and houses. 
Hunger made him remember them, as he 
came through the wood on his nightly hunt 
after hares. He knew well that the beavers 
\A ere safe ; that months of intense cold had 
made their thick mud walls like granite. 
^^'t he came, nevertheless, just to pretend 
J had caught one, and to remember how 
ood his last full meal tasted when he ate it, 
in October. 

It was all so boy-like, so unexpected, there 



209 




We^uilders 



2IO 




in the heart of the wilderness, that I quite 
forgot that I wanted the lynx's skin. I was 
Tfie iQuilders hungry too, and went out for a sniff at the 
ventilator; and it smelled good. I remem- 
bered the time, once, when I had eaten 
beaver, and was glad to get it. I walked 
about among the houses. On every dome 
there were lynx tracks, old and new, and the 
prints of a blunt nose in the snow. Evi- 
dently he came often to dine on the smell of 
good dinners. I looked the way he had 
gone, and began to be sorry for him. But 
there were the beavers, safe and warm and 
fearless within two feet of me, listening un- 
doubtedly to the strange steps without. And 
that was good ; for they are the most interest- 
ing creatures in all the wilderness. 

Most of us know the beaver chiefly in a 
simile. " Working like a beaver," or " busy 
as a beaver," is one of those proverbial expres- 
sions that people accept without comment or 
curiosity. It is about one-third true, which 
is a generous proportion of truth for a prov- 
erb. In winter, for five long months at least, 
he does nothing but sleep and eat and keep 



warm. " Lazy as a beaver " is then a good 
figure. And summer time is just one long 
holiday, and the beavers are jolly as grigs, 
with never a thought of work from morning 
till night. When the snow is gone, and the 
streams are clear, and the twitter of bird 
songs meets the beaver's ear as he rises from 
the dark passage, under water, that leads to 
his house, — then he forgets all settled habits 
and joins in the general heyday of nature. 
The well-built house that sheltered him from 
storm and cold, and defied even the wolver- 
ine to dig its owner out, is deserted for any 
otter's den or chance hole in the bank, where 
he may sleep away the sunlight in peace. 
The great dam, upon which he toiled so 
many nights, is left to the mercy of the 
freshet or the canoeman's axe ; and no plash 
of falling water through a break — that sound 
which, in autumn or winter, brings the beaver 
like a flash — will trouble his wise little head 
for a moment. 

All the long summer he belongs to the 
tribe of Ishmael, wandering through lakes 
and streams wherever fancy leads him. It 



211 




T/ie^u/7cfer3 



212 



T/)e 





is as if he were bound to see the world after 
being cooped up in his narrow quarters all 
winter. Even the strong family ties, one of 
the most interesting things in beaver life, 
are for the time loosened. Every family 
group, when it breaks up housekeeping in 
the spring, represents five generations. First, 
there are the two old beavers, heads of the 
family and absolute rulers, who first engi- 
neered the big dam and houses, and have 
directed repairs for nobody knows how long. 
Next in importance are the baby beavers, no 
bigger than musquashes, with fur like silk 
velvet, and eyes always wide open at the 
wonders of the first season out; then the 
one- and two-year-olds, frisky as boys let 
loose from school, always in mischief and 
having to be looked after, and occasionally 
nipped; then the three-year-olds, who pres- 
ently leave the group and go their separate 
ways in search of mates. So the long days 
go by in a kind of careless summer excursion ; 
and when one finds their camping ground 
in his own summer roving through the 
wilderness, he looks upon it with curious 



sympathy. Fellow campers are they, pitch- 
ing their tents by sunny lakes and alder- 
fringed, trout-haunted brooks, always close 
to Nature's heart, and loving the wild, free 
life much as he does himself. 

But when the days grow short and chill, 
and the twitter of warblers gives place to the 
honk of passing geese, and wild ducks gather 
in the lakes, then the heart of the beaver 
goes back to his home ; and presently he fol- 
lows his heart. September finds them gath- 
ered about the old dam again, the older 
heads filled with plans for repair and new 
houses and winter food and many other 
things. The grown-up males have brought 
their mates back to the old home ; the 
females have found their places in other 
family groups. It is then that the beaver 
begins to be busy. 

His first concern is for a stout dam across 
the stream that will give him a pond and 
plenty of deep water. To understand this, 
one must remember that the beaver intends 
to shut himself in a kind of prison all winter. 
He knows well that he is not safe on land 



213 




214 




a moment after the snow falls; that some 
prowling lucivee or wolverine would find his 
Tfie iQuilders tracks and follow him, and that his escape to 
water would be cut off by thick ice. So he 
plans a big claw-proof house with no entrance 
save a tunnel in the middle, which leads 
through the bank to the bottom of his artifi- 
cial pond. Once this pond is frozen over, 
he cannot get out till the spring sun sets 
him free. But he likes a big pond, that he 
may exercise a bit under water when he 
comes down for his dinner; and a deep 
pond, that he may feel sure the hardest win- 
ter will never freeze down to his doorway 
and shut him in. Still more important, the 
beaver's food is stored on the bottom; and 
it would never do to trust it to shallow 
water, else some severe winter it would get 
frozen into the ice, and the beavers starve 
in their prison. Ten to fifteen feet usually 
satisfies their instinct for safety; but to get 
that depth of water, especially on shallow 
streams, requires a huge dam and an enor- 
mous amount of work, to say nothing of 
planning. 




An enormous amount of work 



Beaver dams are solid structures always, 
built up of logs, brush, stones, and driftwood, 
well knit together by alder poles. One sum- 
mer, in canoeing a wild, unknown stream, I 
met fourteen dams within a space of five 
miles. Through two of these my Indian 
and I broke a passage with our axes; the 
others were so solid that it was easier to 
unload our canoe and make a portage than 
to break through. Dams are found close 
together, like that, when a beaver colony has 
occupied a stream for years unmolested. 
The food-wood above the first dam being cut 
off, they move down stream ; for the beaver 
always cuts on the banks above his dam, and 
lets the current work for him in transporta- 
tion. Sometimes, when the banks are such 
that a pond cannot be made, three or four 
dams will be built close together, the back- 
water of one reaching up to the one above, 
like a series of locks on a canal. This is to 
keep the colony together, and yet give room 
for play and storage. 

There is the greatest difference of opinion 
as to the intelligence displayed by the 



215 




T/ie^u/7cfers 



2l6 



Tf)e is ui Icier s 




beavers in choosing a site for their dam, one 
observer claiming skill, ingenuity, even reason 
for the beavers ; another claiming a mere 
instinctive haphazard piling together of mate- 
rials anywhere in the stream. I have seen 
perhaps a hundred different dams in the wil- 
derness, nearly all of which were well placed. 
Occasionally I have found one that looked 
like a stupid piece of work — two or three 
hundred feet of alder brush and gravel, 
across the widest part of a stream, when, by 
building just above or below, a dam one- 
fourth the length might have given them 
better water. This must be said, however, 
for the builders, that perhaps they found a 
better soil for digging their tunnels, or a 
more convenient spot for their houses near 
their own dam; or that they knew what 
they wanted better than their critic did. 
Undoubtedly the young beavers make fre- 
quent mistakes; but I think, from studying 
a good many dams, that they profit by dis- 
aster, and build better; and that, on the 
whole, their mistakes are not proportionally 
greater than those of human builders. 



Sometimes a dam proves a very white 
elephant on their hands. The site is not 
well chosen, the shores above being too low, 
and the restrained water pours round the 
end of their dam, cutting it away. They 
build the dam longer at once ; but again the 
water sweeps past on its work of destruction. 
So they keep on building, an interminable 
structure, till the frosts come, and they must 
cut their wood and tumble their houses 
together in a desperate hurry to be ready 
when the ice closes over them. 

On alder streams, where the current is 
sluggish and the soil soft, one sometimes finds 
a wonderfully ingenious device to remedy 
the above difficulty. When the dam is built, 
and the water deep enough for safety, the 
beavers dig a canal around one end of the dam 
to carry off the surplus water. I know of noth- 
ing in all the woods and fields that brings one 
closer in thought and sympathy to the little 
wild folk than to come across one of these 
canals, the water pouring safely through it, the 
dam stretching straight and solid across the 
stream, and the domed houses rising beyond. 



217 




2l8 



m 




Once I found where the beavers had 
utilized man's work. A huge dam had been 
Jj^e iQuilders built on a wilderness stream to secure a head 
of water for driving logs from the lumber 
woods. When the pines and fourteen-inch 
spruce were all gone, the works were aban- 
doned, and the dam left — with the gates 
open, of course. A pair of young beavers, 
prospecting for a winter home, found the 
place and were suited exactly. They rolled 
a sunken log across the gates for a founda- 
tion, filled them up solidly with alder bushes 
and stones, and the work was done. When 
I found the place they had a pond a mile 
wide to play in. Their house was in a beau- 
tiful spot, under a big hemlock; and their 
doorway slanted off into twenty feet of water. . 
That site was certainly well chosen. 

Another dam, that I found one winter 
when caribou-hunting, was wonderfully well 
placed. No engineer could have chosen 
better. It was made by the same colony the 
lynx was after, and just below where he went 
through his pantomime for my benefit ; his 
tracks were there too. The barrens, of 



219 




'Guilders 



which I spoke, are treeless plains in the 
northern forest, the beds of ancient shallow 
lakes. The beavers found one with a stream 
running through it, and followed the stream 
to the foot of the barren, where two wooded 
points came out from either side and almost 
met. Here was formerly the outlet ; and 
here the beavers built their dam, and so 
made the old lake over again. It must be a 
wonderfully fine place in summer — two or 
three thousand acres of playground, full of 
cranberries and luscious roots. In winter it 
is too shallow to be of much use, save for a 
few acres about the beavers' doorways. 

There are three ways of dam-building in 
general use among the beavers. The first is 
for use on sluggish streams, where they can 
build up from the bottom. Two or three 
sunken logs form the foundation. Sticks, 
driftwood, and stout poles which the beavers 
cut on the banks, are piled on this and iM^^' IM^^'' ^\/^ 
weighted with stones and mud. 1 he stones ' fW^^^^'^^^^'f ■; 
are rolled in from the bank or moved con- ' 'l ' ,.■ 

siderable distances under water. The mud J''''' , ;,,„r' 

is carried m the beavers paws, which he 



-AC-, 




220 

T/)e 'Guilders 




holds up against his chin, so as to carry a 
big handful without spilling. 

Beavers love such streams, with their alder 
shade and sweet grasses and fringe of wild 
meadow, better than all other places. And, 
by the way, most of the natural meadows 
and half the ponds of New England were 
made by beavers. If you go to the foot of 
any little meadow in the woods and dig at 
the lower end, where the stream goes out, 
you will find, sometimes ten feet under the 
surface, the remains of the first dam that 
formed the meadow when the water flowed 
back and killed the trees. 

The second kind of dam is for swift 
streams. Stout, ten-foot brush is the chief 
material. The brush is floated down to the 
spot selected ; the tops are weighted down 
with stones, and the butts left free, pointing 
down stream. Such dams must be built out 
, w/('if'fifW'*'^t'- -"v-. from the sides, of course. They are gener- 
-''^t'^tl'if ally arched, the convex side being up stream, 



'^t'J^Wi^^i^ - SO as to make a stronger structure. When 
^>'^' Jk?r;'3r^^^'C- the arch closes in the middle, the lower side 
H'w;ii f¥ ^^^^i^ji q£ ^YiQ dam is banked heavily with earth 





and stones. That is shrewd policy on the 
beaver's part ; once the arch is closed by 
brush, the current can no longer sweep 
away the earth and stones used for the 
embankment. 

The third kind is the strongest and easiest 
to build. It is for places where big trees lean 
out over the stream. Three or four beavers 
gather about a tree and begin to cut, sitting 
up on their broad tails. One stands above 
them on the bank, apparently directing the 
work. In a short time the tree is nearly 
cut through from the under side. Then the 
beaver above begins to cut down carefully. 
With the first warning crack he jumps aside, 
and the tree falls straight across, where it is 
wanted. All the beavers then disappear and 
begin cutting the branches that rest on the 
bottom. Slowly the tree settles till its trunk 
is at the right height to make the top of the 
dam. The upper branches are then trimmed 
close to the trunk, and are woven with alders 
among the long stubs sticking down from 
the trunk into the river bed. Stones, mud, 
and brush are used liberally to fill the chinks, 



221 




We^ui/c/ers 



222 




and in a remarkably short time the dam is 
complete. 

Tfie lSui7c/ers ^^^ ^^^ beaver's cutting is done by chisel- 
edged front teeth. There are two of these 
in each jaw, extending a good inch and a 
half outside the gums, and meeting at a 
sharp bevel. The inner sides of the teeth 
are softer and wear away faster than the 
outer, so that the bevel remains the same ; 
and the action of the upper and lower teeth 
over each other keeps them always sharp. 
They grow so rapidly that a beaver must 
be constantly wood cutting to keep them 
worn down to comfortable size. 

Often, on wild streams, you find a stick 
floating down to meet you showing a fresh 
cut. You grab it, and say : " Somebody is 
camped above here. That stick has just 
been cut with a sharp knife." But look 
closer ; see that faint ridge the whole length 
of the cut, as if the knife had a tiny gap in 
its edge. That is where the beaver's two 
upper teeth meet, and the edge is not quite 
perfect. He cut that stick, thick as a man's 
thumb, at a single bite. To cut an alder, as 



round as a teacup, is the work of a minute 
for the same tools ; and a towering poplar 
tree falls in a remarkably short time when 
attacked by three or four beavers. Around 
the stump of such a tree you find a pile of 
two-inch chips, thick, clean cut and arched 
to the curve of the beaver's teeth. Judge 
the workman by his chips, and this is a 
good workman. 

When the dam is built the beaver cuts 
his winter food-wood. A colony of the crea- 
tures will often fell a whole grove of young 
birch or poplar on the bank above the dam. 
The branches with the best bark are then 
cut into short lengths, which are rolled into 
the stream and floated to the pool at the 
dam. 

Considerable discussion has taken place 
as to how the beaver sinks his wood — for 
of course he must sink it ; else it would 
freeze into the ice and be useless. The 
simplest way is to cut the wood early and 
leave it in the water, when it sinks of itself; 
for green birch and poplar soon get water- 
logged and go to the bottom. If the nights 



22 




rne^uMers 



224 

Tfie Ibuilders 




grow suddenly cold before the wood sinks, 
the beavers take it down to the bottom and 
press it slightly into the mud ; or else they 
push sticks under those that float against 
the dam, and more under these ; and so on 
till the stream is full to the bottom, the 
weight of those above keeping the others 
down. Much of the wood is lost in this 
way by being frozen into the ice ; but the 
beavers know that, and cut plenty. 

When a beaver is hungry, in winter, he 
comes down under the ice, selects a stick, 
carries it up into his house, and eats the 
bark. Then he carries the peeled stick back 
under the ice, and puts it aside out of the 
way. 

Once it occurred to me that soaking 
spoiled the flavor of bark, and that the bea- 
vers might like a fresh bite. So I cut a hole 
in the ice on the pool above their dam. Of 
course the chopping scared the beavers ; it 
was vain to experiment that day. I spread 
a blanket and some thick boughs over the 
hole to keep it from freezing over too thickly, 
and went away. 



Next day I pushed the end of a fresh birch 
pole down among the beavers' store, lay 
down with my face to the hole, drew a big 
blanket round my head to shut out the light, 
and watched. For a while it was all dark as 
a pocket ; then I began to see things dimly. 
Presently a shadow shot along the bottom 
and grabbed the pole. It was a beaver, with 
a twenty-dollar coat on. He tugged ; I held 
on tight — which surprised him so that he 
went back into his house to catch breath. 

But the taste of fresh bark was in his 
mouth, and soon he was back with another 
beaver. Both took hold this time and pulled 
together. No use ! They began to swim 
round, examining the queer pole on every 
side. " What kind of a stick are you, any- 



think: 



You didn't 



way r one was inmRmg. 
grow here, because I would have found you 
long ago." " And you 're not frozen into the 
""id the other, "because you wiggle." 



ice, sail 



Then they both took hold again, and I began 
to haul up carefully. I wanted to see them 
nearer. That surprised them immensely ; 
but I think they would have held on, only 



225 




T/)eT3u/7(/er3 



226 




for an accident. The blanket slipped away ; 
a stream of light shot in ; there were two 
T/)e iQuHders g^^^^ whirls in the water ; and that was 
the end of the experiment. They did not 
come back, though I waited till I was almost 
frozen. 

The beaver's house is the last thing at- 
tended to. He likes to build when the nights 
grow cold enough to freeze his mortar soon 
after it is laid. Two or three tunnels are 
dug from the bottom of the beaver pond 
up through the bank, coming to the surface 
together at the point where the center of the 
house is to be. Around this he lays solid 
foundations of log and stone in a circle from 
six to fifteen feet in diameter, according to 
the number of beavers to occupy the house. 
On these foundations he rears a thick mass 
of sticks and grass, which are held together 
by plenty of mud. The top is roofed by 
stout sticks arranged as in an Indian wig- 
wam, and the whole domed over with grass, 
stones, sticks, and mud. Once this is solidly 
frozen, the beaver sleeps in peace ; his house 
is burglar proof. 



•-'^?^«S« 




227 




If on a lake shore, where the rise of water 
is never great, the beaver's house is four 
or five feet high. On streams subject to 
freshets the houses are much higher. As in 

the case of the musquash, a strano^e instinct 'J^^' ^ ., , 

.1 .1 1 • ^ . • • ^1 1 • 1 . fWe^uilders 

guides the beaver ni determmmg the height 

of his dwehing. He builds high or low, 

according to his expectations of high or low 

water; and he is rarely drow^ied out of the 

dry nest just under his curious dome. 

Sometimes two or three families unite to 
build a single large house ; but always, in 
such cases, each family has its separate apart- 
ment. When a house is dug open it is evi- 
dent, from the different impressions, that 
each member of the family has his own bed, 
which he always occupies. Beavers are ex- 
emplary in their neatness ; the house after 
five months' use is as neat as w^hen first 
made. 

All their building is primarily a matter of 
instinct, for a tame beaver builds miniature 
dams and houses on the floor of his cage. 
Still it is not an uncontrollable instinct, like 
that of most birds; nor blind, like that of 




o rats and squirrels at times. I have found 
228 ^ 

beaver houses on lake shores where no dam 

T/ie iQuilders ^'^^ built, simply because the water was deep 
enough, and none was needed. In vacation 
time the young beavers build for fun, just as 
boys build a dam wherever they can find 
running water. I am persuaded also (and 
this may explain some of the dams that seem 
stupidly placed) that at times the old beavers 
set the young to work in summer, in order 
that they may know how to build when it 
becomes necessary. This is a hard theory 
to prove, for the beavers work by night, 
preferably on dark, rainy nights, when they 
are safest on land to gather materials. But 
while building is instinctive, skilful building 
is the result of practice and experience. And 
some of the beaver dams show w^onderful 
skill. 

There is one beaver who never builds; 
who never troubles himself about house, 
or dam, or winter's store. I am not sure 
whether we ought to call him the genius 
or the lazy man of the family. The bank- 
beaver is a solitary old bachelor, living in a 



den, like a mink, in the bank of a stream. 
He does not build a house, because a den 
under a cedar's roots is as safe and warm. 
He never builds a dam, because there are 
deep places in the river, where the current 
is too swift to freeze. He finds tender twigs 
much juicier, even in winter, than stale bark 
stored under water. As for his telltale 
tracks in the snow, his wits must guard 
him against enemies ; and there is the open 
stretch of river to flee to. 

There are two theories among Indians and 
trappers to account for the bank-beaver's 
eccentricities. The first is that he has failed 
to find a mate and leaves the colony, or is 
driven out, to lead a lonely bachelor life. 
His conduct during the mating season cer- 
tainly favors this theory ; for never was any- 
body more diligent in his search for a wife 
than he. Up and down the streams and 
alder brooks of a whole wild countryside he 
wanders without rest, stopping here and 
there on a grassy point to gather a little 
handful of mud, like a child's mud pie, all 
patted smooth, in the midst of which is a 



229 




We^u/Vc/ers 



2 30 




little strong-smelling musk. When you find 
that sign, in a circle of carefully trimmed 
Tfie iQuiIders grass under the alders, you know that there 
is a young beaver on that stream looking for 
a wife. And when the young beaver finds 
his pie opened and closed again, he knows 
that there is a mate somewhere near, waiting 
for him. But the poor bank-beaver never 
finds his mate, and the next winter must go 
back to his solitary den. He is much more 
easily caught than other beavers ; and the 
trappers say it is because he is lonely and 
tired of life. 

The second theory is that generally held 
by Indians. They say the bank-beaver is 
lazy and refuses to work with the others; so 
they drive him out. When beavers are busy 
they are very busy, and tolerate no loafing. 
Perhaps he even tries to persuade them that 
all their work is unnecessary, and so shares 
the fate of reformers in general. 

While examining the den of a bank-beaver 
last summer, another theory suggested itself. 
Is not this one of the rare animals in which 
all the instincts of his kind are lacking? He 



does not build because he has no impulse to 
build ; he does not know how. So he repre- 
sents what the beaver was, thousands of 
years ago, before he learned how to con- 
struct his dam and house, — reappearing now, 
by some strange freak of heredity, and find- 
ing himself wofully out of place and time. 
The other beavers drive him away because 
all gregarious animals and birds have a strong 
fear and dislike of any irregularity in their 
kind. Even when the peculiarity is slight 
— a wound, or a deformity — they drive the 
poor victim from their midst remorselessly. 
It is a cruel instinct, but part of one of the 
oldest in creation, the instinct which pre- 
serves the species. This explains why the 
bank-beaver never finds a mate ; none of the 
beavers will have anything to do with him. 

This occasional lack of instinct is not 
peculiar to the beavers. Now and then a 
bird is hatched here in the North that has 
no impulse to migrate. He cries after his 
departing comrades, but never follows. So 
he remains, and is lost in the storms of 
winter. 




rne'VuMers 



232 




There are few creatures in the wilderness 
more difficult to observe than the beavers, 
T/)e l3u/7c/ers both on account of their extreme shyness 
and their habit of working only by night. 
The best way to watch them at work is to 
make a break in their dam and pull the top 
from one of their houses, some autumn after- 
noon, at the time of full moon. Just before 
twilight you must steal back and hide, some 
distance from the dam. Even then the 
chances are against you, for the beavers are 
suspicious, keen of ear and nose, and gener- 
ally refuse to show themselves till after the 
moon sets or you have gone away. You 
may have to break their dam half a dozen 
times before you see it repaired. 

It is a most interesting sight when it 
comes at last, and well repays the watching. 
The water is pouring through a five-foot 
break in the dam ; the roof of a house is in 
ruins. You have rubbed yourself all over 
with fir boughs, to destroy some of the scent 
in your clothes, and hidden yourself in the top 
of a fallen tree. The twilight goes ; the moon 
wheels over the eastern spruces, flooding 



the river with silver hght. Still no sign 
of life. You are beginning to think of 
another disappointment ; to think your toes 
cannot stand the cold another minute with- 
out stamping, which would spoil everything, 
when a ripple shoots swiftly across the pool, 
and a big beaver comes out on the bank. 
He sits up a moment, looking, listening; 
then goes to the broken house and sits up 
again, looking it all over, estimating dam- 
ages, making plans. There is a commotion 
in the water; three others join him. — You 
are warm now. 

Meanwhile three or four more are swim- 
ming about the dam, surveying the damage 
there. One dives to the bottom, but comes 
up in a moment to report all safe below. 
Another is tugging at a thick pole just 
below you. Slowly he tows it out in front, 
balances a moment and lets it go — squarely 
across the break. Two others are cutting 
alders above ; and here come the bushes, 
floating down, to repair the dam. Over at 
the damaged house two beavers are on the 
walls, raising the rafters into place ; a third 



We^u/Vcfers 




2 34 




appears to be laying on the outer covering; 
a fourth is plastering with mud. Now and 
T/)e iQuiIders ^^^^ ^^^ sits up straight, like a rabbit, lis- 
tens, stretches his back to get the kinks out, 
then drops to his work again. 
. It is brighter now; moon and stars are 
glimmering in the pool. At the dam the 
sound of falling water grows faint, as the 
break is rapidly closed. The houses loom 
larger. Over the 
dome of the one 
broken the dark 
outline of 
beaver passes 
triumphantly. 




Quick work that. You grow more inter- 
ested; you stretch your neck to see — ^ 
splash ! A beaver gUding past has seen 
you. As he dives he gives the water a 
sharp blow with his broad tail, the danger 
signal of the beavers, and a startling one in 
the dead stillness. There is a sound as of a 
stick being plunged end first into the water ; 
a few eddies go running about the pool, 
breaking up the moon's reflection ; then 
silence again, and the lap of ripples on the 
shore. 

You can go home now ; you will see noth- 
ing more to-night. There is a beaver under 
the other bank, in the shadow where you 
cannot see him, just his eyes and ears above 
water, watching you. He will not stir; nor 
will another beaver come out till you go 
away. As you find your canoe and paddle 
back to camp, a ripple, made by a beaver's 
nose, follows silently in the shadow of the 
alders. At the bend of the river, where you 
disappear, the ripple halts a while, like a pro- 
jecting stub in the current, then turns and 
goes swiftly back. There is another splash ; 



235 




We^uilders 



236 



the builders come out again ; a dozen ripples 
are scattering star reflections all over the 
T/ie iQuilders pool 5 while the little wood folk pause a 
moment to look at the new works curiously, 
then go their ways, shy, silent, industrious, 
through the wilderness night. 




??\ 






V--— --"* 



^^ « f 






237 



UPWEEKIS THE SHADOW 



ONG 'go, O long time go," so says 
Simmo the Indian, 
Upweekis the lynx 
came to Clote Scarpe 
with a complaint. 
" See," he said, " you 
are good to every- 
body but me. Pek- 
quam the fisher is 
cunning and pa- 
[i / '-^ " tient ; he can catch 
l)*^' '^f/ ' what he will. Lhoks the 
^^^ panther is strong and 
tireless ; nothing can get 
away from him, not even 
the great moose. And 
Mooween the bear sleeps 
all winter, when game is 
scarce, and in summer 
eats everything, — roots 

239 




:i^\£;^ 



240 



Shadouj 



and mice and berries and dead fish and meat 
and honey and red ants. So he is always 
Upojeekis ^"^ ^^<^ happy. But my eyes are no good ; 
r^^ they are bright, hke Cheplahgan the eagle's, 
yet they cannot see anything unless it moves ; 
for you have made every creature that hides 
just like the place he hides in. My nose is 
worse ; it cannot smell Seksagadagee the 
grouse, though I walk over him asleep in 
the snow. And my feet make a noise in 
the leaves, so that Moktaques the rabbit 
hears me, and hides, and laughs behind me 
when I go to catch him. And I am always 
hungry. Make me now like the shadows 
that play, in order that nothing may notice 
me when I go hunting." 

So Clote Scarpe, the great chief who was 
kind to all animals, gave Upweekis a soft 
gray coat that is almost invisible in the 
woods, summer or winter, and made his feet 
large, and padded them with soft fur; so 
that indeed he is like the shadows that play, 
for you can neither see nor hear him. But 
Clote Scarpe remembered Moktaques the 
rabbit also, and gave him two coats, a brown 



one for summer and a white one for winter. 

241 
Consequently he is harder than ever to see 

when he is quiet ; and Upweekis must still (/uai^^l^is 

depend upon his wits to catch him. As tfie . fe 

Upweekis has few wits to spare, Moktaques ^'^^^^^ £^ 

often sees him close at hand, and chuckles in 

his form under the brown ferns, or sits up 

straight, under the snow-covered hemlock 

tips, to watch the big lynx at his hunting. 



Sometimes, on a winter night, when you 
camp in the wilderness, and the snow is sift- 
ing down into your fire, and the woods are 
all still, a fierce screech breaks suddenly out 
of the darkness just behind your windbreak 
of boughs. You jump to your feet and grab 
your rifle ; but Simmo, who is down on his 
knees before the fire, frying pork, only turns 
his head to listen a moment, and says: 
" Upweekis catch-um rabbit dat time." Then 
he gets closer to the fire and goes on with 
his cooking. 

You are more curious than he, or you 
want the big cat's skin to take home with 
you. You steal away towards the cry, past 




the little commoosie that you made hastily at 
sundown when the trail ended. There, with 
Upofeekis Y^^^ back to the fire, the light does not 
~% f^G dazzle your eyes ; you can trace the shadows 

creeping in and out among the underbrush. 
But if Upweekis is there — and he probably 
is — you do not see him. He is a shadow 
among the shadows. Only there is this dif- 
ference : shadows move no bushes. As you 
watch, a fir-tip stirs ; a bit of snow drops 
down. You gaze intently at the spot. Then 
out of the deep shadow two living coals are 
suddenly kindled. They grow larger and 
larger, glowing, flashing, burning your eyes 
till you brush them swiftly with your hand. 
Your rifle jumps to position ; the glowing coals 
are quenched on the instant. Then, when 
your eyes have blinked the fascination out 
of them, the shadows go creeping in and out 
again, and Upweekis is lost amongst them. 

Sometimes you see him again. Mokta- 
ques, the big white hare, v/ho forgets a thing 
the moment it is past, sees you standing- 
there and is full of curiosity. He forgets 
that he was being hunted a moment ago, and 




comes to see what you are. You back away 
toward the fire. He scampers off in a fright, 
but presently comes hopping after you. (Jpojeekls 
Watch the underbrush behind him sharply, tfie Bl»^ 

In a moment it stirs stealthily, as if a shadow 
were moving it ; and there is the lynx, steal- 
ing along in the snow with his eyes blazing. 
Again Moktaques feels that he is hunted, 
and does the only safe thing; he crouches 
low in the snow, where a fir-tip bends over 
him, and is still as the earth. His color 
hides him perfectly. 

Upweekis has lost the trail again ; he 
wavers back and forth, like a shadow under 
a swinging lamp, turning his great head from 
side to side. He cannot see nor hear nor 
smell his game ; but he saw a bit of snow fly 
a moment ago, and knows that it came from 
Moktaques' big pads. Don't stir now; be 
still as the great spruce in whose shadow you 
stand ; and, once in a hunter's lifetime, you 
will see a curious tragedy. 

The lynx settles himself in the snow, with 
all four feet close together, ready for a spring. 
As you watch and wonder, a screech rings 




out through the woods, so sharp and fierce 
that no rabbit's nerves can hear it and be 
Upojeekis still. Moktaques jumps straight up in the 
'^^r ^ ^i^- ^^^ lynx sees it, whirls, hurls himself 
at the spot. Another screech, a different 
one, and then you know that it 's all over. 

And that is why Upweekis' cry is so fierce 

and sudden on a winter night. Your fire 

attracts the rabbits. Upweekis knows this, 

,../^-,^ and comes to hide amons^ the 

\ -<iy^ ''^ ^^' '"^> shadows. But he never catches 

4 i^'^-iff'&^i anything unless he blunders onto 

rCr^^' jJhlMjt it. That is why he wanders so 

^ ^ ^. vj^ much m wmter, and passes twenty 

rabbits before he catches one. So 

when he knows that Moktaques is near, 

watching the light, but remaining himself 

invisible, Upweekis crouches for a spring; 

then he screeches fearfully. Moktaques hears 

it and is startled, as anybody else would be, 

hearing such a cry near him. He jumps in 

a fright and pays the penalty. 

If the lynx is a big one, and very hungry, 
as he generally is in winter, you may get 
some unpleasant impressions of him in 




245 



another way wlien you venture far from 

your fire. His eyes blaze out at you from 

the darkness, just two big glowing spots, ^^^^yj-^ 

which are all you see, and which disappear ffie 

at your first motion. Then as you strain ^f^^dow 

your eyes, and watch and listen, you feel the 

coals upon you again from another place ; 

and there they are, under a bush on your 

left, creeping closer and blazing deep red. 

They disappear suddenly as the lynx turns 

his head, only to reappear and fascinate you 

from another point. So he plays with you, 

as if you w^ere a great mouse, creeping closer 

all the time, swishing his stub tail fiercely 

to lash himself up to the courage point of 

springing. But his movements are so still 

and shadowy that unless he follows you as 

you back away to the fire, and so comes 

within the circle of light, the chances are 

that you will never see him. 

Indeed the chances are always that way, 
day or night, unless you turn hunter and set 
a trap for him in the rabbit paths which he 
follows nightly, and hang a bait over it to 
make him look up and forget his steps. In 




^ summer he goes to the burned lands for the 
rabbits that swarm in the thickets, and to 
rr I • rear his young in seclusion. You find his 

$ fhe tracks there all about, and the marks of his 

rDnaaouj j^iHi^g; but though you watch and prowl all 
day and come home in the twilight, you will 
learn little. He hears you and skulks away 
amid the lights and shadov/s of the hillside, 
and so hides himself — in plain sight, some- 
times, like a young partridge — that he man- 
ages to keep a clean record in the notebook 
where you hoped to write down all about him. 
In winter you cross his tracks, great round, 
tracks that wander everywhere through the 
big woods, and you think: Now I shall find 
him surely. But though you follow for 
miles and learn much about him, finding 
where he passed this rabbit close at hand, 
without suspecting it, and caught that one 
by accident, and missed the partridge that 
burst out of the snow under his very feet, — 
still Upweekis himself remains only a shadow 
of the woods. Once, after a glorious long 
tramp on his trail, I found the spot where he 
had been sleeping a moment before. But 



beside that experience I must put fifty other 
trails that I have followed, of which I never 



saw the end nor the beginning. And when- [Jpweekls 



ever I have found out anything about Up- ffie 
weekis, it has generally come unexpectedly, 
as most good things do. 

Once the chance came as I was watching 
a muskrat at his supper. It was twilight in 
the woods. I had drifted in close to shore 
in my canoe to see what Musquash was 
doing on top of a rock. All muskrats have 
favorite eating places — a rock, a stranded 
log, a tree boll that leans out over the water, 
and always a pretty spot — whither they 
bring food from a distance, evidently for the 
purpose of eating it where they feel most at 
home. This one had gathered a half-dozen 
big fresh-w^ater clams upon his dining table, 
and sat down in the midst to enjoy the feast. 
He would take a clam in his fore paws, 
whack it a few times on the rock till the 
shell cracked, then open it with his teeth and 
devour the morsel inside. He ate leisurely, 
tasting each clam critically before swallow- 
ing, and sitting up often to wash his whiskers 




248 



Shadouj 



or to look out over the lake. A hermit 
thrush sang marvelously sweet above hhn; 
l/pojeeA/s th^ twilight colors glowed deep and deeper 
fne in the water below, where his shadow was 
clearly eating clams also, in the midst of 
heaven's splendor. — Altogether a pretty 
scene, and a moment of peace that I still 
love to remember. I quite forgot that Mus- 
quash is a villain. 

But the tragedy was near, as it always is 
in the wilderness. Suddenly a movement 
caught my eye on the bank above. Some- 
thing was waving nervously under the 
bushes. Before I could make out what it 
was, there was a fearful rush, a gleam of 
wild yellow eyes, a squeak from the musk- 
rat. Then Upweekis, looking gaunt and 
strange in his summer coat, was crouched 
on the rock with Musquash between his 
great paws, growling fiercely as he cracked 
the bones. He bit his game all over, to 
make sure that it was quite dead, then 
took it by the neck, glided into the 
bushes with his stub tail twitching, and 
became a shadow again. 




Another time I was perched up in a 
lodged tree, some twenty feet from the 
ground, watching a big bait of fish which wt / • 

I had put in an open spot for anything that //je ^ 

might choose to come and get it. I was ^"^^^^ 
hoping for a bear, and so chmbed above 
the ground that he might not get my scent, 
should he come from leeward. It was early 
autumn, and my intentions were wholly 
peaceable. I had no weapon of any kind. 

Late in the afternoon something took to 
chasing a red squirrel near me. I heard 
them scurrying through the trees, but could 
see nothing. The chase passed out of hear- 
ing, and I had almost forgotten it, for some- 
thing w^as moving in the underbrush near 
my bait, when back it came with a rush. 
The squirrel, half dead with fright, leaped 
from a spruce tip to the ground, jumped to 
the tree in which I sat, and raced up the 
incline to my feet before seeing me, when 
he sprang to a branch and sat chattering 
hysterically between two fears. After him 
came a pine marten, following swiftly, catch- 
ing the scent of his game, not from the bark 




or the ground, but apparently from the air. 
Scarcely had he jumped upon my tree when 
(Jnojeekis ^^^^^ ^^^ ^ screech and a rush in the under- 
$ i^G brush just below him, and out of the bushes 

came a young lynx to jom m the chase. 
He missed the marten on the ground, but 
sprang to my tree like a flash. I remember 
that the only sound I was conscious of at 
the time was the ripping of his nails in the 
dead bark. He had been seeking my bait 
undoubtedly — it was a good lynx country, 
and Upweekis loves fish like a cat — when 
the chase passed under his nose and he 
joined it on the instant. 

Halfway up the incline the marten smelled 
me, or was terrified by the noise behind him, 
and leaped aside. A branch upon which. I 
was leaning swayed or snapped, and the 
lucivee stopped as if struck, crouching lower 
and lower against the tree, his big, yellow, 
expressionless eyes glaring straight into 
mine. A moment only he stood the steady 
look; then his eyes wavered; he turned his 
head, leaped for the underbrush, and was 
gone. 



251 



Another moment, and Meeko the squirrel 
had forgotten his fright and peril and every- 
thing else save his curiosity to find out who [Joajeekis 
I was and all about me. He had to pass ffie 
quite close to me to get to another tree, but ^'^^^^^ 
anything was better than going back where 
the marten might be waiting; so he was 
presently over my head, snickering and 
barking to make me move, and scolding 
me soundly for disturbing the peace of the 
woods. 

In summer Upweekis is a solitary creature, 
rearing his young on the wildest burned 
lands, where game is plenty and where it is 
almost impossible to find him, except by acci- 
dent. In winter also he roams alone for the 
most part; but occasionally, when rabbits 
are scarce, as they are periodically in the 
northern woods, he gathers in small bands 
for the purpose of pulling down big game 
that he would never attack singly. Gener- 
ally Upweekis is skulking and cowardly with 
man ; but when driven by hunger or when 
hunting in bands, he is a savage beast and 
must be followed cautiously. 




252 



I had heard much of the fierceness of these 

hunting bands from settlers and hunters; 

Upojeekls ^^^ once a friend of mine, an old backwoods- 

0^^^r / man, had a narrow escape from them. He 

l^8^3. had a dog, Grip, a big brindled cur, of whose 

prowess in killing " varmints " he was always 

bragging, calling him the best " lucififer " 

dog in all Canada. Lucififer, by the way, 

is a local name for the lynx on the upper 

St. John, where Grip and his master lived. 

One day the master missed a young heifer 
and went on his trail, with Grip and his axe 
for companions. Presently he came to lynx 
tracks, then to signs of a struggle, then plump 
upon six or seven of the big cats snarling 
savagely over the body of the heifer. Grip, 
the lucififer dog, rushed in blindly, and in 
two minutes was torn to ribbons. Then the 
lynxes came creeping and snarling towards 
the man, who backed away, shouting and 
swinging his axe. He killed one by a lucky 
blow, as it sprang for his chest. The others 
drove him to his own door; but he would 
never have reached it, so he told me, but for 
a long strip of open land that he had cleared 



back into the woods. He would face and 

253 

charge the beasts, which seemed more afraid 

of his voice than of the axe, then run des- (jQateekis 

perately to keep them from circhng and get- tne 

ting between him and safety. When he ^^^^^^ 

reached the open strip they followed a little 

way along the edges of the underbrush, but 

returned, one at a time, when they were sure 

he had no further mind to disturb their feast 

or their fighting. 

It is curious that, when Upweekis and his 
hunting pack pull down game in this way, 
the first thing they do is to fight over it. 
There may be meat enough and to spare, 
but under their fearful hunger is the old 
beastly instinct for each one to grab all for 
himself ; so they fall promptly to teeth and 
claws before the game is dead. The fight- 
ings at such times are savage affairs, both to 
the eye and ear. One forgets that Upweekis 
is a shadow, and thinks that he must be a 
fiend. 

One day in winter, when after caribou, I 
came upon a very large lynx track, the 
largest I have ever seen. It was two days 





254 



Shadouj 



old; but it led in my direction, toward the 
caribou barrens, and I followed it to see what 

fhe Presently it joined four other lynx trails ; 
and a mile farther on all five trails went for- 
ward in great Hying leaps, each lynx leaving 
a hole in the snow as big as a bucket at every 
jump. A hundred yards of this kind of 
traveling and the trails joined another trail, — 
that of a wounded caribou from the barrens. 
His tracks showed that he had been travel- 
ing with difficulty on three legs. Here was 
a place where he had stood to listen; and 
there was another place where even untrained 
eyes might see that he had plunged forward 
with a start of fear. It was a silent story, 
but full of eager interest in every detail. 

The lucivee tracks now showed different 
tactics. They crossed and crisscrossed the 
trail, appearing now in front, now behind, 
now on either side the wounded bull, evi- 
dently closing in upon him warily. Here 
and there was a depression in the snow 
where one had crouched, growling, as the 
game passed. Then the struggle began. 




MH -"^ti^'r^. 




The stripped carcass of the caribou with two lynxes still upon it 



First, there was a trampled place in the snow 
where the bull had taken a stand and the 
big cats went creeping about him, waiting (Jpweekls 
for a chance to spring all together. He broke fne 
away from that, but the three-legged gallop 
speedily exhausted him. Only when he 
trots is a caribou tireless. The lynxes fol- 
lowed; the deadly cat-play began again. 
First one, then another leaped, only to be 
shaken off ; then two, then all five were upon 
the poor brute, which still struggled forward. 
The record was written red all over the 
snow. 

As I followed it cautiously, a snarl sounded 
just ahead. I kicked off my snowshoes and 
circled noiselessly to the left, so as to look 
out over a little opening. There lay the 
stripped carcass of the caribou with two 
lynxes still upon it, growling fearfully at 
each other as they pulled at the bones. An- 
other lynx crouched in the snow, under a 
bush, watching the scene. Two others cir- 
cled about each other snarling, looking for 
an opening, but too well fed to care for a 
fight just then. Two or three foxes, a pine 




^ marten, and a fisher moved ceaselessly in 
and out, sniffing hungrily, and waiting for 
Upojeeh/s ^ chance to seize every scrap of bone or 
5^^ # ^^^^ ^^^^ ^^^ ^^^^ unguarded for an instant 
Above them a dozen moose birds kept the 
same watch vigilantly. As I stole nearer, 
hoping to get behind an old log where I 
could lie and watch the spectacle, some crea- 
ture scurried out of the underbrush at one 
side. I was watching the movement, when 
a loud kee-yaaah ! startled me ; I whirled 
towards the opening. From behind the log 
a fierce round head with tasseled ears rose 
up, and the big lynx, whose trail I had first 
followed, sprang into sight snarling and spit- 
ting viciously. 

The feast stopped at the first alarm. The 
marten disappeared instantly. The foxes 
and the fisher and one lynx slunk away. 
Another, which I had not seen, stalked up 
to the carcass and put his fore paws upon it, 
and turned his savage head in my direction. 
Evidently other lynxes had come in to the 
kill beside the five I had followed. Then 
all the big cats crouched in the snow and 



257 



stared at me steadily out of their wild 
yellow eyes. 

It was only for a moment. The big lynx Upweekis 
on my side of the log was in a fighting '^^ , 
temper; he snarled continuously. Another 
sprang over the log and crouched beside 
him, facing me. Then began a curious 
scene, of which I could not wait to see the 
end. The two lynxes hitched nearer and .-^ 
nearer to where I stood motionless, watch- ^^^^ i" 
ing. They would creep forward a step or 
two, then crouch in the snow, like a cat 
warming her feet, and stare at me unblink- 
ingly for a few moments. Then another 
hitch or two, which brought them nearer, 
and another stare. I could not look at one 
steadily, to make him waver ; for the moment 
my eyes were upon him the others hitched 
closer; and already two more lynxes were 
coming over the log. I had to draw the 
curtain hastily with a bullet between the 
yellow eyes of the biggest lynx, and a second 
straight into the chest of his fellow-starer, 
just as he wriggled down into the snow for a 
spring. The others had leaped away snarling 








-\_ t ,\ 



^ as the first heavy report rolled through the 
woods. 
Upojeekis Another time, in the same region, a soli- 
^^r ^ ^^^y ^y^^ made me uncomfortable for half an 
afternoon. It was Sunday, and I had gone 
for a snowshoe tramp, leaving my rifle behind 
me. On the way back to camp I stopped 
for a caribou head and skin, which I had 
cached on the edge of a barren the morning 
before. The weather had changed ; a bitter 
cold wind blew after me as I turned toward 
camp. I carried the head with its branching 
antlers on my shoulder ; the skin hung down, 
to keep my back warm, its edges trailing in 
the snow. 

Gradually I became convinced that some- 
thing was following me ; but I turned several 
times without seeing anything. " It is only 
a fisher," I thought, and kept on steadily, 
instead of going back to examine my trail; 
for I was hoping thus to catch a glimpse of 
the cunning creature, whose trail you find so 
often running side by side with your own, 
and who follows you, if you have any trace 
of game about you, hour after hour through 



the wilderness, without ever showing: himself 

259 

in the light. Then I whirled suddenly, obey- 
ing an impulse ; and there was Upweekis, a rjuateekis 
big, savage-looking fellow, just gliding up on tfie fe 

my trail in plain sight, following the broad ^'^^^^^ Jr 
snowshoe track and the scent of the fresh 
caribou skin without difficulty, poor trailer 
though he be. 

He stopped and sat down on his feet, as 
a lucivee generally does when you surprise 
him, and stared at me steadily. When I 
went on again I knew that he was after me, 
though he had disappeared from the trail. 

Then began a double-quick of four miles, 
the object being to reach camp before night 
should fall and give the lucivee the advan- 
tage. It was already late enough to make 
one a bit uneasy. He knew that I was 
hurrying; he grew bolder, showing himself 
openly on the trail behind me. I turned 
into an old swamping road, which gave me a 
bit of open before and behind. Then I saw 
him occasionally on either side, or crouch- 
ing half hid until I passed. Clearly he was 
waiting for night ; but to this day I am not 



Ml 




. sure whether it was the man or the caribou 
260 

skin upon which he had set his heart. The 

Upojeekis scent of flesh and blood was in his nose, and 

1^- f^^ he was too huns^ry to control himself much 
obaaouj , 

longer. 

I cut a good club with my big jack-knife 
and, watching my chance, threw off the car- 
ibou head and jumped for him as he crouched 
in the snow. He leaped aside untouched, 
but crouched again instantly, showing all 
his teeth, snarling horribly. Three times I 
swung at him. warily. Each time he jumped 
aside and watched for his opening; but I 
kept the club in play before his eyes, and it 
was not yet dark enough. Then I yelled in 
his face, to teach him fear, and went on again. 

Near camp I shouted for Simmo to bring 
my rifle ; but he was slow in understanding, 
and his answering shout alarmed the savage 
creature near me. His movements became 
instantly more wary, more hidden. He left 
the open trail; and once, when I saw him 
well behind me, his head was raised high, 
listening. I threw down the caribou head 
to keep him busy, and ran for camp. In a 




few minutes I was stealing back again with , 

my rifle ; but Upweekis had felt the change 

in the situation and was again among the it /, • 

shadows, where he belongs. I lost his trail ffjie M^ 

in the darkening woods. Shadouj ^JL. 

There was another lynx which showed 
me, one day, a different side to Upweekis' 
nature. It was in summer, when every ani- 
mal in the wilderness seems an altogether 
different creature from the one you knew 
last winter, with new habits, new duties, new 
pleasures, and even a new coat to hide him 
better from his enemies. 

Opposite my island camp, where I halted 
a little while in a summer's roving, was the 
best cover for game that I have ever found 
in the wilderness. Years ago the fire had 
swept over it; now it was a perfect tangle, 
with sunny open spots here and there, where 
berries grew by handfuls. Rabbits swarmed 
there, and grouse were plenty. As it was 
forty miles back from the settlements, it 
seemed a perfect place for Upweekis to 
make a den in. And so it was. I have no 
doubt there were a dozen litters of kittens on 



262 



that two miles of ridge ; but the cover was 
so dense that nothing smaller than a deer 

Upojeekls ^^^^^ ^^ ^^^^ moving. 
3^ J^G For two weeks I hunted the ridge when- 
ever I v/as not fishing, stealing in and out 
among the thickets, depending more upon 
ears than eyes, but seeing nothing of 
Upweekis, save here and there a trampled 
fern, or a blood-splashed leaf, with a bit of 
rabbit fur, or a great round cat track, to tell 
the story. Once I came upon a bear and 
two cubs among the berries ; and once, when 
the wind was blowing down the hill, I walked 
almost up to a bull caribou without seeing 
him. He was watching my approach curi- 
ously, only his horns showing above the 
tangle where he stood. Down in the coverts 
it was always intensely still, with a stillness 
that I took good care not to break. So when 
the great brute whirled, with a snort and 
a tremendous crash of bushes, almost under 
my nose, it raised my hair for a moment, not 
knowing what the creature was, nor which 
way he was heading. But though every day 
brought its experience, and its knowledge. 



and its new wonder at the ways of wild 

things, I found no trace of the den, nor 

of the kittens I had hoped to watch. All fjocneek/s 

animals are silent near their little ones, so ffie 

there was never a cry by night or day to ^"^*^^^ 

guide me. 

Late one afternoon, when I had climbed 
to the top of the ridge and was on my way 
back to camp, I ran into an odor, — the 
strong, disagreeable odor that always hovers 
about the den of a carnivorous animal. I fol- 
lowed it through a thicket, and came to an 
open stony place, with a sharp drop of five 
or six feet to dense cover below. The odor 
came from this cover, so I jumped down ; 
when — yeow, karrrr, pft-p/t ! Almost under 
my feet a gray thing leaped away snarling, 
followed by another. I had the merest 
glimpse of them; but from the way they 
bristled and spit and arched their backs, I 
knew that I had stumbled upon a pair of the 
lynx kittens, for w^hich I had searched so 
long in vain. 

They had, probably, been lying out on the 
warm stones, until, hearing strange footsteps, 




. they glided away to cover. When I crashed 
down near them they had been scared into 
[/nojeek/s ^^^^ing their temper ; else I had never seen 
■^ ihe them in the underbrush. Fortunately for 

me, the fierce old mother was away. Had 
she been there, I should have had more 
serious business on hand than watching her 
kittens. 

They had not seen more of me than my 
shoes and stockings; so when I stole after 
them, to see what they were like, they were 
waiting under a bush to see what I was like. 
They jumped away again, spitting, without 
seeing me, alarmed by the rustle which I 
could not avoid making in the cover. So I 
followed them, just a quiver of leaves here, 
a snarl there, and then a rush away, until 
they doubled back towards the rocky place, 
where, parting the underbrush cautiously, I 
saw a dark hole among the rocks of a little 
opening. The roots of an upturned tree 
arched over the hole, making a broad door- 
way. In this doorway stood two half -grown 
lucivees, fuzzy and gray and savage-looking, 
their backs still up, their wild eyes turned 



Shadoco 



in my direction apprehensively. Seeing me, ^ 
they drew farther back into the den, and I 
saw nothing more of them save, now and (Jpcoeekls 
then, their round heads, or the fire in their fpe 
yellow eyes. 

It was too late for further observation that 
day. The fierce old mother lynx would 
presently be back ; they would let her know 
of the intruder in some way ; and they would 
all keep close in the den. I found a place, 
some dozen yards above, where it would be 
possible to watch them, marked the spot by 
a blasted stub, to which I made a compass 
of broken twigs; and then went back to 
camp. 

Next morning I omitted the early fishing, 
and was back at the place before the sun 
looked over the ridge. Their den was all 
quiet, in deep shadow. Mother Lynx was 
away on the early hunting. I intended to 
kill her w^hen she came back. My rifle lay 
ready across my knees. Then I would watch 
the kittens a little while, and kill them also. 
I wanted their skins, all soft and fine with 
their first fur. And they were too big and 




fierce to think of taking them alive. My 
vacation was over. Simmo was already 

Upojeekis packing up, to break camp that morning. 

^^^r ^ So there would be no time to carry out 
my long-cherished plan of watching young 
lynxes at play, as I had before watched 
young foxes and bears and owls and fish- 
hawks, and indeed almost everything, except 
Upweekis, in the wilderness. 

Presently one of . the lucivees came out, 
yawned, stretched, raised himself against a 
root. In the morning stillness I could hear 
the cut and rip of his claws on the wood. 
We call the action sharpening the claws ; 
but it is only the occasional exercise of the 
fine flexor muscles that a cat uses so seldom, 
yet must use powerfully when the time comes. 
The second lucivee came out of the shadow 
a moment later and leaped upon the fallen 
tree, where he could better watch the hillside 
below. For half an hour or more, while I 
waited expectantly, both animals moved rest- 
lessly about the den, or climbed over the 
roots and trunk of the fallen tree. They 
were plainly cross ; they made no attempt at 



play, but kept well away from each other, 

with a wholesome respect for teeth and claws - . , • 

T^ 1 r 1 1 Upcueek/s 

and temper. Breakfast hour was long past, /y^^ ^ 

evidently, and they were hungry. . Snadouj m 

Suddenly one, who was at that moment 

watching from the tree trunk, leaped down ; 

the second joined him, and both paced back , 

and forth excitedly. They had heard the ^-g 

sounds of a comins: that were too fine for '^^t> ^ 





my ears. A stir in the underbrush, ^^ ~ 
and Mother Lynx, a great savage 
creature, stalked out proudly. She carried a 
dead hare gripped across the back. The 
long ears on one side, the long legs on the 
other hung limply, showing a fresh kill. 



\.-<^ 



■s 



^^ She walked to the doorway of her den, 

crossed it back and forth two or three 

Upojeekis times, still carrying the hare as if the lust 

f\^ J^G of blood w^ere raging within her and she 
could not drop her prey even to her own 
little ones, which followed her hungrily, one 
on either side. Once, as she turned toward 
me, one of the kittens seized a leg of the 
hare and jerked it savagely. The mother 
whirled on him, growling deep down in her 
throat; the youngster backed away, scared 
but snarling. At last she flung the game 
down. The kittens fell upon it like furies, 
growling at each other, as I had seen the 
stranger lynxes growling, once before, over 
the caribou. In a moment they had torn the 
carcass apart and were crouched, each one 
over his piece, gnarling like a cat over a rat, 
and stuffing themselves greedily, in utter 
forgetfulness of the mother lynx, who lay 
under a bush some distance away and watched 
them. 

In a half hour the savage meal was over. 
The little ones sat up, licked their chops, 
and began to tongue their broad paws. The 



269 



Shadow 



mother had been bHnking sleepily ; now she 

rose and came to her young. A change had 

come over the family. The kittens ran to (Jpojeekis 

meet the dam as if they had not seen her fpe 

before, rubbing softly against her legs, or 

sitting up to rub their whiskers against hers 

— a tardy thanks for the breakfast she had 

provided. The fierce old mother, too, seemed 

altogether different. She arched her back 

against the roots, purring loudly, while the 

little ones arched and purred against her 

sides. Then she bent her savage head and 

licked them fondly with her tongue, while 

they rubbed as close to her as they could get, 

passing between her legs as under a bridge, 

and trying to lick her face in return ; till all 

three tongues were going at once and the 

family lay down together. 

It was time to kill them now. The rifle 
lay ready. But a change had come over 
the watcher too. Hitherto he had seen 
Upweekis as a ferocious brute, whom it was 
good to kill. This was altogether different. 
Upweekis could be gentle, it seemed, and 
give herself for her little ones. And a bit of 




tenderness, like that which lav so uncon- 
270 . ^ 

scious under my eyes, gets hold of a man, 
Upojeehis ^^^ spikes his guns better than moralizing. 
'S^j^i^r ^ So t^^^ watcher stole away, making as little 
noise as possible, following his compass of 
twigs to where the canoes lay ready and 
Simmo was waiting. 




271 



FOX-WAYS 




ID you ever meet a fox face to 
face, surprising him quite as 
much as yourself? If so, you 
were deeply impressed, no 
doubt, by his perfect dignity 
and self-possession. Here is how the meet- 
ing generally comes about. — 

It is a late winter afternoon. You are 
swinging rapidly over the upland pastures, 
or loitering along the winding old road 
through the woods. The color deepens in 
the west ; the pines grow black against it ; 
the rich brown of the oak leaves seems to 
glow everywhere in the last soft light; and 
the mystery, that never sleeps long in the 
woods, begins to rustle again in the thickets. 
You are busy with your own thoughts, see- 
ing nothing, till a flash of yellow passes 

before your eyes, and a fox stands in the 

273 



274 



FoX'TOqys 




path before you, one foot uplifted, the fluffy 
brush swept aside in graceful curve, the 
bright eyes looking straight into yours — 
nay, looking through them, to read the 
intent which gives the eyes their expres- 
sion. That is always the way with a fox; 
he seems to be looking at your thoughts. 

Surprise, eagerness, a lively curiosity are 
all in your face on the instant; but the 
beautiful creature before you draws himself 
together with quiet self-possession. Your 
curiosity seems to him vulgar, and he will 
have none of it. Dropping his head, he 
turns to the left, English fashion, and trots 
slowly past you. There is no hurry ; not the 
shadow of suspicion or uneasiness. His 
eyes are cast down ; his brow wrinkled, as if 
in deep thought; already he seems to have 
forgotten your existence. You watch him 
curiously as he re-enters the path behind you 
and disappears over the hill. Somehow a 
queer feeling, half wonder, half rebuke, steals 
over you; as if you had been outdone in 
courtesy, or had passed a gentleman without 
sufficiently recognizing him. 



Ah, but you did not watch sharply enough ! 
You did not see, as he circled past, that cun- 
ning side gleam of his yellow eyes, which 
understood your attitude perfectly. Had 
you stirred, he would have vanished like a 
flash. You did not run to the top of the 
hill where he disappeared, to see that burst 
of speed the instant he was out of your sight. 
You did not see the capers, the tail-chasing, 
the high jumps, the quick turns and plays ; 
and then the straight, nervous gallop, which 
told more plainly than words his exultation, 
in that he had outwitted you and shown his 
superiority. 

Reynard, wherever you meet him, impresses 
you as an animal of dignity and calculation. 
He never seems surprised, much less fright- 
ened ; never loses his head ; never does 
things hurriedly, on the spur of the moment, 
as a scatter-brained rabbit or meddling squir- 
rel might do. You meet him as he leaves 
the warm rock on the south slope of the old 
oak woods, where he has been curled up 
asleep all the winter afternoon. Now he is 
off on his nightly hunt ; he is trotting along, 



275 




Fox^ays 





head down, brows wrinkled, planning it all 
out. — 

" Let me see," he is thinking, " last night 
I hunted the Draper woods. To-night I '11 
cross the brook and take a look into that 
pasture-corner, among the junipers. There's 
a rabbit that plays round there on moonlight 
nights ; I '11 have him presently. Then I '11 
go down to the big South meadow after 
mice. I have n't been there for a week ; and 
last time I got six. If I don't find mice, 
there 's that chicken coop of old Jenkins. 
Only" — He stops, with his foot up, and 
listens as the far-away bark of a dog floats in 
through the woods — " only he locks the 
coop and leaves the dog loose ever since I 
took the big rooster. Anyway I '11 take a 
look round there. Sometimes Deacon Jones's 
hens get to roosting in the next orchard. 
If I can find them up an apple tree, I '11 bring 
a couple down with a good trick I know. 
On the way — Hi, there ! " 

In the midst of his planning he gives 
a grasshopper-jump aside, and brings both 
paws down hard on a bit of green moss that 



quivered as he passed. He spreads his paws 

cautiously; thrusts his nose between them; 

dras^s a youns^ wood mouse from under the 

moss ; eats him ; Hcks his chops twice, and ^^^ifoi/7/)r^ 

goes on planning as if nothing had happened. 

" On the way back, I '11 swing round by 
the Fales place, and take a sniff under the 
wall by the old hickory, to see if those 
sleepy skunks are still there for the winter. 
I '11 have that whole family before spring, 
if I 'm hungry and can't find anything else. 
They come out on sunny days ; all you have 
to do is just hide behind the hickory and 
watch." 

So off he goes on his well-planned hunt ; 
and if you follow his track to-morrow in the 
snow, you will see how he has gone from 
one hunting ground directly to the next. 
You will find the depression where he lay in 
a clump of tall dead grass and watched a 
while for the rabbit; reckon the number of 
mice he caught in the meadow; see his sly 
tracks about the chicken coop, and in the 
orchard; and pause a moment at the spot 
where he cast a knowing look behind the 




hickory by the wall, — all just as he planned 
it on his way to the brook. 

If you stand by one of his runways while 
the dogs are driving him, expecting to see 
him come tearing along in a desperate hurry, 
frightened out of half his wits by the savage 
uproar behind him, you can only rub your 
eyes in wonder when a fluffy yellow ball 
comes drifting through the woods towards 
you, as if the breeze were blowing it along. 
There he is, trotting down the runway in the 
same leisurely, self-possessed way, wrapped 
in his own thoughts, apparently, the same 
deep wrinkles over his eyes. He played a 
trick or two on a brook, down between the 
ponds, by jumping about on a lot of stones 
from which the snow had melted, without 
wetting his feet (which he dislikes), and with- 
out leaving a track anywhere. While the 
dogs are puzzling that out, he has plenty 
of time to plan more devices on his way to 
the big hill, with its brook, and old walls, 
and rail fences, and dry places under the 
pines, and twenty other helps to an active 
brain. 



First he will run round the hill half a 
dozen times, crisscrossing his trail. That of 
itself will drive the young dogs crazy. Then 
along the top rail of a fence, and a long jump 
into the junipers, which hold no scent, and 
another jump to the wall where there is no 
snow, and then — 

" Oh, plenty of time, no hurry ! " he says to 
himself, turning to listen a moment. " That 
dog with the big voice must be old Roby. 
He thinks he knows all about foxes, just 
because he broke his leg last year, trying 
to walk a sheep-fence where I'd been. I'll 
just creep up the other side of the hill, and 
curl up on a warm rock and watch them all 
break their heads over that crisscross." 

So he trots past you, still planning ; crosses 
the wall by a certain stone, that he has used 
ever since he was a cub fox; seems to float 
across an old pasture, stopping only to run 
about a bit among some cow tracks, to kill 
the scent; and so on towards his big hill. 
Before he gets there he will have a skilful 
retreat planned, back to the ponds, in case 
old Roby untangles his crisscross, or some 



279 




28o 



FoX'TOqys 






young hound circles too near the rock 
whereon he sits, watching the game. 

If you meet him now you will see no quiet 
assumption of superiority ; he knows too well 
what it means to be met on a runway by a 
man with a gun when the dogs are driving. 
With your slightest movement there is a 
flash of yellow fur, and he has vanished into 
the thickest bit of underbrush at hand. — 
Don't run; you will not see him again here. 
He knows the old roads and paths far better 
than you do, and can reach his big hill by 
any one of a dozen routes where you would 
never dream of looking. But if you want 
another glimpse of him, take the shortest 
cut to the hill. He may take a nap, or sit 
and listen a while to the dogs, or run round 
a swamp before he gets there. Sit on the 
wall in plain sight; make a post of yourself; 
keep still, and keep your eyes open. 

Once, in just such a place, I had a rare 
chance to watch him. It was on the sum- 
mit of a great bare hill. Down in the woods 
five or six hounds were waking the winter 
echoes merrily on afresh trail. I was hoping 




for a sight of Reynard when he appeared ^ 
from nowhere, on a rock not fifty yards 
away. There he lay, his nose between his . '.^tK^^ 
paws, listening with quiet interest to the ^.B^l pox-ZOays 
uproar below. Occasionally he raised his |^ 
head as some young dog scurried near, yelp- 
ing maledictions upon a perfect tangle 
of fox tracks, none of which went any- 
where. Suddenly he sat up straight, 
twisted his head sideways, as a dog does 
when he sees the most interesting thing 
of his life, dropped his tongue 
out a bit, and looked intently. 
I looked too, and there, just /^/'"M' /f 
below, was old Roby, the best ^' ' 4"!"^ 
foxhound in a dozen coun- 
ties, creeping like a cat along the top rail 
of a sheep-fence, now putting his nose down 
to the wood, now throwing his head back 
for a great howl of exultation. — It was all 
immensely entertaining; and nobody seemed 
to be enjoying it more than the fox. 

One of the most fascinating bits of animal 
study is to begin at the very beginning of 
fox education. Find a fox den, and go there 





„ some afternoon in early June, and hide at a 
282 . J J ^ 

distance, where you can watch the entrance 
fbx'TOavs through your field-glass. Every afternoon 
the young foxes come out to play in the 
sunshine, like so many kittens. Bright little 
bundles of yellow fur they seem, full of tricks 
and whims, with pointed faces that change 
only from exclamation to interrogation points. 
For hours at a stretch they roll about, and 
chase tails, and pounce upon the quiet old 
mother with fierce little barks. One climbs 
laboriously up the rock behind the den, and 
sits on his tail, gravely surveying the great 
landscape with a comical little air of impor- 
tance, as if he owned it all. When called to 
come down he is afraid, and makes a great 
to-do about it. Another has been crouch- 
ing for five minutes behind a tuft of grass, 
watching like a cat for some one to come by 
and be pounced upon. A third is worrying 
something on the ground — a cricket, or a 
doodle-bug; and the fourth never ceases to 
worry the patient old mother, till she moves 
away and lies down by herself in the shadow 
of a ground cedar. 



As the afternoon wears away, and long 
shadows come creeping up the hillside, the 
mother rises suddenly and goes back to the 
den; the little ones stop their play and 
gather about her. You strain your ears for 
the slightest sound, but hear nothing; yet 
there she is, plainly talking to them ; and 
they are listening. She turns her head, and 
the cubs scamper into the den's mouth. A 
moment she stands listening, looking; while, 
just within the dark entrance, you get 
glimpses of four pointed black noses and a 
cluster of bright little eyes, wide open for a 
last look. Then she trots away, planning 
her hunt, till she disappears down by the 
brook. When she is gone, eyes and noses 
draw back; only a dark silent hole in the 
bank is left. You will not see them again; 
not unless you stay to watch by moonlight 
till Mother Fox comes back, with a fringe of 
field mice hanging from her lips, or a young 
turkey thrown across her shoulders. 

If you watch day after day, you may dis- 
cover a bit of rare shrewdness on the part of 
Mother Fox : she never troubles the poultry 



283 




}Fox^ays 




of the farms nearest her den. She will 
forage for miles in every direction; will 
harass the chickens of distant farms till 
scarcely a handful remains of those that 
wander into the woods, or sleep in the open 
yards; yet she will pass by and through 
nearer farms without turning aside to hunt, 
except for mice and frogs; and, even when 
hungry, will note a flock of chickens within 
sight of her den, and leave them undisturbed. 
She seems to know perfectly that a few miss- 
ing chickens will lead to a search ; that 
boys' eyes will speedily find her den, and 
boys' hands dig eagerly for a litter of young 
foxes. 

Curiously enough, the cubs, for whose 
peaceful bringing-up the mother so cun- 
ningly provides, do not imitate her caution. 
They begin their hunting by lying in ambush 
about the nearest farm ; the first stray chicken 
they see is game. Once they begin to plun- 
der in this way, and feed full on their own 
hunting, parental authority is gone; the 
mother deserts the den immediately, leading 
the cubs far away. But some of them go 



back, contrary to all advice, and pay the 
penalty. Sooner or later some cub is caught 
stealing chickens in broad daylight, and is 
chased by dogs. The foolish youngster 
takes to earth, instead of trusting to his 
legs ; so the long-concealed den is discovered 
and dug open at last. 

When an old fox, foraging for her young 
at night, discovers by her keen nose that a 
flock of hens has been straying near the 
woods, she goes next day and hides herself 
there, lying motionless for hours at a stretch 
in a clump of dead grass or berry bushes, 
till the flock comes near enough for a rush. 
Then she hurls herself among them, and in 
the confusion seizes one by the neck, throws 
it by a quick twist across her shoulders, and 
is gone before the stupid hens find out what 
it is all about. 

But when a fox finds an old hen or turkey 
straying about with a brood of chicks, then 
the tactics are altogether different. Creep- 
ing up like a cat, the fox watches an oppor- 
tunity to seize a chick out of sight of the 
mother bird. That done, he withdraws. 



285 




Fox^oys 



286 




silent as a shadow, his grip on the chick's 
neck preventing any outcry. Hiding his 
Fox-lOays game at a distance, he creeps back to cap- 
ture another in the same way ; and so on till 
he has enough, or till he is discovered, or 
some half-strangled chick finds breath enough 
for a squawk. A hen or turkey knows the 
danger by instinct, and hurries her brood 
into the open at the first suspicion that a fox 
is watching. 

A farmer first told me how a fox manages 
to carry a number of chicks at once. He 
heard a clamor from a hen-turkey and her 
brood one day, and ran to a wood path in 
time to see a vixen make off with a turkey 
chick scarcely larger than a robin. Several 
were missing from the brood. He hunted 
about, and presently found ^n^ more, just 
killed. They were beautifully laid out, the 
bodies at a broad angle, the necks crossing 
each other, like the corner of a corn-cob 
house, in such a way that, by gripping the 
necks at the angle, all the chicks could be 
carried at once, half hanging at either side 
of the fox's mouth. Since then I have seen 



an old fox with what looked like a dozen or 
more field mice carried in this way; only, of 
course, the tails were crossed corn-cob fashion 
instead of the necks. 

The stealthiness with which a fox stalks his 
game is most remarkable. Stupid chickens 
are not the only birds captured. Once I 
read in the snow the story of his hunt after 
a crow — wary game to be caught napping! 
The tracks showed that a flock of crows had 
been walking about an old field, bordered 
by pine and birch thickets. From the rock 
where he was sleeping away the afternoon 
the fox saw or heard them, and crept down. 
How cautious he was about it! Following 
the tracks, one could almost see him stealing 
along from stone to bush, from bush to grass 
clump, so low that his body pushed a deep 
trail in the snow, till he reached the cover 
of a low pine on the very edge of the field. 
There he crouched with all four feet close 
together under him. Then a crow came by 
within ten feet of the ambush. The tracks 
showed that the bird was a bit suspicious; 
he stopped often to look and listen. When 



287 




xZOays 




oo his head was turned aside for an instant the 
fox launched himself; just two jumps, and 
foX'TOsys he had him. Quick as he was, the wing 
marks showed that the crow had started, 
and was pulled down out of the air. Rey- 
nard carried him into the densest thicket he 
could find, and there ate him. 

A strong enmity exists between crows and 
foxes. Whenever Reynard ventures abroad 
by day, the crows are sure to find and chase 
him with noisy clatter, which he detests, till 
he creeps into a thicket of scrub pines, into 
which no crow will ever venture, and lies 
down there till he tires out their patience. 
In hunting, one may frequently trace the 
exact course of a fox, which the dogs are 
driving, by the crows clamoring over him. 
Here in the snow was a record that may 
help explain one side of the feud. 

From the same white page one may read 
many other stories of Reynard's ways and 
doings. Indeed, I know of no more inter- 
esting winter w^alk than to follow his trail 
through the soft snow. There is always some- 
thing new, either in the track or the woods 





through which it leads ; always a fresh 
hunting story; always a disappointment or 
two, a long cold wait for a rabbit that 
did not come, or a miscalculation over the 
length of the snow tunnel where a part- 
ridge burrowed for the night. Generally, if 
you follow far enough, there is also a story 
of good hunting, which leaves you wavering 
between congratulation over a successful 
"stalk, after nights of patient, hungry wander- 
ing, and pity for the little tragedy told so 
vividly by converging trails, a few red drops 
in the snow, a bit of fur blown about by the 
wind, or a feather clinging listlessly to the 
underbrush. In such a tramp one learns 
much of fox-ways and other ways that can 
never be learned elsewhere. 



289 




The fox whose life has been spent on the 
hillsides near a New England village seems 
to have profited by generations of experience. 
He is much more cunning than the fox of 
the wilderness. If, for instance, a fox has 
been stealing your chickens, your trap must 
be very cunningly set if you are to catch 



290 




him. It will not do to set it near the 
chickens; no inducement will be great 
foX'TOavs ^^ough to bring him within yards of it. It 
must be set well back in the woods, near one 
of his regular hunting grounds. Before that, 
however, you must bait the fox with choice 
bits scattered over a pile of dry leaves or 
chaff, sometimes for a week, sometimes for a 
month, till he comes regularly. Then smoke 
your trap, or scent it; handle it only with 
gloves; set it in the chaff; scatter bait as 
usual ; and you have one chance of getting 
him, while he has still a dozen of getting 
away. In the wilderness, on the other hand, 
he may be caught with half the precaution. 
I know a little fellow, whose home is far 
back from the settlements, who catches five 
or six foxes every winter by ordinary wire 
snares set in the rabbit paths, where foxes 
love to hunt. 

In the wilderness one often finds tracks 
in the snow, telling how a fox tried to 
catch a partridge and only succeeded in 
frightening it into a tree. After watching 
a while hungrily, — one can almost see him 



licking his chops under the tree, — he trots 
off to other hunting grounds. If he were 
an educated fox he would know better than 
that. 

¥/hen an old New England fox, in some 
of his nightly prowlings, discovers a flock of 
chickens roosting in the orchard, he generally 
gets one or two. His plan is to come by 
moonlight, or else just at dusk, and bark 
sharply to attract the chickens' attention. 
If near the house, he does this by jumping, 
lest the dog or the farmer hear his barking. 
When the chickens begin to flutter and 
cackle, as they always do when disturbed, he 
circles the tree slowly, jumping and clacking 
his teeth. The chickens crane their necks 
down to follow him. Faster and faster he 
goes, racing in small circles, till some foolish 
fowl grows dizzy with twisting her head, or 
loses her balance and tumbles down, only to 
be snapped up and carried off across his 
shoulders in a twinkling. 

But there is one way in which fox of the 
wilderness and fox of the town are alike 
easily deceived. Both are very fond of mice, 



29 




Fox^ays 




and respond quickly to the squeak, which 
can be imitated perfectly by drawing the 
Fox-ZOays breath in sharply between closed lips. The 
next thing, after that is learned, is to find a 
spot in which to try the effect. 

Two or three miles back from all New 
England towns are certain old pastures and 
clearings, long since run wild, in which 
young foxes love to meet and play on moon- 
light nights, just as rabbits do. When well 
fed, and therefore in no hurry to hunt, the 
heart of a young fox turns naturally to fun 
and capers. The playground may easily be 
found by following the tracks after the first 
snowfall. If one goes to the place on some 
still, bright night in autumn, and hides on 
the edge of the open, he stands a good chance 
of seeing two or three foxes playing there. 
Only he must himself be still as the night; 
else, should twenty foxes come that way, he 
will never see one. 

It is always a pretty scene, the quiet open- 
ing in the woods flecked with soft gray 
shadows in the moonlight, the dark sentinel 
evergreens keeping silent watch about the 



place, the wild little creatures playing about 
among the junipers, flitting through light 
and shadow, jumping over each other and 
tumbling about in mimic warfare, all uncon- 
scious of a spectator as the foxes that played 
there before the white man came, and before 
the Indians. Such scenes do not crowd 
themselves upon one. He must wait long, 
and love the woods, and be often disap- 
pointed ; but when they come at last, they 
are worth all the love and the watching. 
And when the foxes fail, there is always 
something else that is beautiful. — 

Now squeak like a mouse, in the midst of 
the play. Instantly the fox nearest you 
stands, with one foot up, listening. Another 
squeak, and he makes three or four swift 
bounds in your direction, only to stand listen- 
ing again ; he has not quite located you. 
Careful now ! don't hurry ; the longer you 
keep him waiting, the more certainly he is 
deceived. Another squeak ; some more swift 
jumps that bring him within ten feet; and 
now he smells or sees you, sitting motionless 
on your boulder in the shadow of the pines. 



293 





However surprised he is, he shows no sign 
of it ; he only looks you over indifferently, as 
fox-ZOays i^ he were used to finding people sitting on 
that particular rock. Then he trots off with 
an air of having forgotten something. With 
all his cunning he never suspects you of 
being the mouse. That little creature he 
believes to be hiding under the rock; and 
to-morrow night he will take a look there, or 
respond to your squeak in the same way. 

It is only early in the season, generally 
before the snow blows, that one can see them 
playing. Later in the season — either be- 
cause the cubs have lost their playfulness, or 
because they must hunt diligently for enough 
to eat — they seldom do more than take a 
gallop together, with a playful jump or two, 
before going their separate ways. At all 
times, however, they have a strong tendency 
to fun and mischief-making. More than 
once, in winter, I have surprised a fox flying 
round after his own bushy tail so rapidly that 
tail and fox together looked like a great 
yellow pin-wheel on the snow. 

When a fox meets a toad or frog, and is 




He only looks you over indifferently 



295 




not hungry, he worries the poor thing for an 
hour at a time ; and when he finds a turtle 
he turns the creature over with his paw, sit- 
ting dowai gravely to watch its awkward ^^W/^x-Z^<9K5 
struggle to get back upon its feet. At such |^ 
times he has a most humorous expression, 
brows wrinkled and tongue out, as if he were 
enjoying himself hugely. 

Later in the season he would be glad 
enough to make a meal of toad or turtle. 
One day in March the sun shone out bright 
and warm ; in the afternoon the first frogs 
began to tune up, cr-r-r-runk, cr-r-runk-a- 
runk-runk, like a flock of brant in the dis- 
tance. I was watching them at a marshy 
spot in the woods, where they had come out 
of the mud by dozens into a bit of open 
w^ater, when the bushes parted cautiously 
and the sharp nose of a fox appeared. The 
hungry fellow had heard them from the hill 
above, where he was asleep, and had come 
down to see if he could catch a few. He 
was creeping out on the ice when he smelled 
me, and trotted back into the woods. 

Once I saw him catch a frog. He crept 




down to where Chigwooltz, a fat green bull- 
frog, was sunning himself by a lily pad, and 
FoX'TOays "^^^Y cautiously stretched out one paw under 
water. Then, with a quick fling, he tossed 
his game to land, and was after him like a 
flash before he could scramble back. 

On the seacoast Reynard depends largely 
on the tides for a living. An old fisherman 
assures me that he has seen him catching 
crabs there in a novel way. Finding a quiet 
bit of water where the crabs are swimming 
about, he trails his brush over the surface 
till one rises and seizes it with his claw (a 
most natural thing for a crab to do), where- 
upon the fox springs away, jerking the crab 
to land. Though a fox is careful as a cat 
about wetting his tail or feet, I shall not be, 
surprised to find some day for myself that 
the fisherman was right. 

His way of beguiling a duck is more re- 
markable than his fishing. Late one after- 
noon, while following the shore of a pond, 
I noticed a commotion among some tame 
ducks, and stopped to see what it was about. 
They were swimming in circles, quacking and 



stretching their wings, in great excitement. 
As I glanced over the bank something 
sHpped out of sight into the tall grass. My 
eyes followed the waving tops intently, and 
I caught one sure glimpse of a fox as he 
disappeared into the woods. 

The thing puzzled me for years, though I 
suspected some foxy trick, till a duck-hunter 
explained to me what Reynard was doing. 
He had seen it tried successfully on a flock 
of wild ducks. — 

When a fox finds a flock of ducks feeding 
near shore, he trots down and begins to play 
on the beach. Ducks are full of curiosity, 
especially about unusual colors and objects 
too small to frighten them ; the playing ani- 
mal speedily excites a lively interest. They 
stop feeding, gather close together, spread, 
circle, come together again, stretching their 
necks as straight as strings to look and listen. 

Then the fox begins his performance. He 
jumps high, to snap at imaginary flies; he 
chases his bushy tail ; he rolls over and over 
in clouds of flying sand ; he gallops up the 
shore, and back like a whirlwind; he plays 



297 




Fox^ays 



298 



peekaboo with every bush. The fooHsh 




birds grow excited; they swim in smaller 
foX'TOeys circles, quacking nervously, drawing nearer 
and nearer to get a better look at the strange 
performance. They are long in coming ; but 
curiosity always gets the better of them; 
those in the rear crowd the front rank for- 
ward. All the while the show goes on, the 
performer paying not the slightest attention, 
apparently, to his excited audience ; only he 
draws slowly back from the water's edge, as if 
to give them room while they crowd nearer. 
They are on shore at last; then, while 
they are lost in the most astonishing caper 
of all, the fox dashes among them, throwing 
them into the wildest confusion. His first 
snap never fails to throw a duck upon the 
sand with a broken neck; and he has gen- 
erally time for a second, often for a third, 
before the flock escapes into deep water. 
Then he buries all his birds but one, throws 
that across his shoulders, and trots off, wag- 
ging his head, to some quiet spot, where he 
can eat his dinner and take a good nap 
undisturbed. 



When, with all his cunning, Reynard is 
caught napping, he makes use of another 
good trick he knows. One winter morning 
my friend, the old fox-hunter, rose at day- 
light for a run with the dogs over the new- 
fallen snow. Before calling his hounds, he 
went to feed the chickens. As he reached 
the roost, his steps making no sound in the 
snow, he noticed the trail of a fox crossing 
the yard and entering the coop through a 
low opening. No trail came out ; it flashed 
upon him that the fox must be inside at that 
moment. 

Hardly had he reached this conclusion 
when a wild cackle arose that left no doubt 
about it. On the instant he whirled a box 
against the opening, at the same time pound- 
ing lustily to frighten the thief from killing 
more chickens. Reynard was trapped sure 
enough. The fox-hunter listened at the 
door; but, save for an occasional cut-aa-cut^ 
not a sound was heard within. 

Very cautiously he opened the door and 
squeezed through. There lay a fine pullet, 
stone dead; just beyond lay the fox, dead too. 



299 




Fox^ays 



./W- 




300 




" Well, of all things," said the fox-hunter, 
open-mouthed, " if he has n't gone and 
Fox-TlJays climbed the roost after that pullet, and then 
tumbled down and broke'n his own neck ! " 

Highly elated with this unusual beginning 
of his hunt, he picked up the fox and the 
pullet and laid them down together on the 
box outside, while he fed his chickens. 

When he came out, a minute later, there 
was the box and a feather or two, but no fox 
and no pullet. Deep tracks led out of the 
yard and up over the hill in flying jumps. 
Reynard had played possum. 

There was no need to look farther for 
a good fox track. Soon the music of the 
hounds went ringing over the hill and down 
the hollow; but though the dogs ran true,' 
and the hunter watched the runways all day 
with something more than his usual interest, 
he got no glimpse of the wily old fox. Late 
at night the dogs came limping home, weary 
and footsore, but with never a long yellow 
hair clinging to their chops to tell a story. 

Several times since then I have known of 
his playing possum in the same way. The 



little fellow whom I mentioned as living near 
the wilderness, and snaring foxes, once caught 
a black fox — a rare, beautiful animal, with a 
very valuable skin — in a trap which he had 
baited for weeks in a wild pasture. It was 
the first black fox he had ever seen; and, 
boy-like, he thought it only a matter of mild 
wonder to find the beautiful creature frozen 
stiff, apparently, with one hind leg fast in the 
trap. 

He carried the prize home, trap and all, 
over his shoulder. At his whoop of exulta- 
tion the whole family came out to admire 
and congratulate. At last he took the trap 
from the fox's leg, and stretched him out on 
the doorstep to gloat over the treasure and 
stroke the glossy fur to his heart's content. 
His attention was taken away for a moment; 
then he had a dazed vision of a flying black 
animal that seemed to perch an instant on the 
log fence and vanish among the spruces. 

Poor Johnnie! There were tears 
in his eyes when he told 



301 




Fox^ays 



me about it, 
afterwards. 



three 



years _>_ 





THEMIDp 



303 



TOOK H BE S 







H^..«JITTLE Tookhees the wood mouse, 
— the 'Fraid One, as Simmo calls 
him, — always makes two appear- 
ances when you squeak to bring 
him out. First, after much peeking, he runs 
out of his tunnel ; sits up once on his hind 
legs; rubs his eyes with his paws; looks 
up for the owl, and behind him for the fox, 
and straight ahead at the tent where, the 
man lives ; then he dives back headlong into 
his tunnel with a rustle of leaves and a 
frightened whistle, as if Kupkawis the little 
305 






^ owl had seen him. That is to reassure him- 
306 

self. In a moment he comes back softly to 
TooT{hees see what kind of crumbs you have given 

Frafd One ^^"^* 

No wonder Tookhees is so timid, for there 

is no place in earth or air or water, outside 
his own little doorway under the mossy 
stone, where he is safe. Above him the 
owds watch by night and the hawks by day; 
around him not a prowler of the wilderness, 
from Mooween the bear down through a 
score of gradations, to Kagax the weasel, 
but will sniff under every old log in the 
hope of finding a wood mouse ; and if he 
takes a swim, as he is fond of doing, not a 
big trout in the river but leaves his eddy to 
rush at the tiny ripple holding bravely across 
the current. So, with all these enemies 
waiting to catch him the moment he ven- 
tures out, Tookhees must needs make one 
or two false starts in order to find out where 
the coast is clear. 

That is why he always dodges back after 
his first appearance; why he gives you two 
or three swift glimpses of himself, now here. 



307 



Fraid One 



now there, before coming out into the Hght. 
He knows his enemies are so hungry, so 
afraid he will get away or that somebody TookTiees 
else will catch him, that they jump for him .^^ 
the moment he shows a whisker. So eager 
are they for his flesh, and so sure, after miss- 
ing him, that the swoop of wings or the 
snap of red jaws has scared him into perma- 
nent hiding, that they pass on to other trails. 
And when a prowler, watching from behind 
a stump, sees Tookhees flash out of sight 
and hears his startled squeak, he thinks 
naturally that the keen little eyes have seen 
the tail, which he forgot to curl close enough, 
and so sneaks away as if ashamed of himself. 
Not even the fox, whose patience is without 
end, has learned the wisdom of waiting for 
Tookhees' second appearance. And that is 
the salvation of the little 'Fraid One. 

From all these enemies Tookhees has 
one refuge, the little arched nest beyond 
the pretty doorway, under the mossy stone. 
Most of his enemies can dig, to be sure, but 
his tunnel winds about in such a way that 
they never can tell from the looks of his 



3o8 

>ees 

ffie 

Fraid One 




doorway where it leads to; and there are no 
snakes in the wilderness to follow and find 
Too7{f)ees out. Occasionally I have seen where Moo- 
^^ ween has turned the stone over and clawed 
the earth beneath ; but there is generally a 
tough root in the way, and Mooween con- 
cludes that he is taking too much trouble 
for so small a mouthful, and shuffles off to 
the log where the red ants live. 

On his journeys through the woods Took- 
hees never forgets the dangerous possibili- 
ties. His progress is a series of jerks, and 
whisks, and jumps, and hidings. He leaves 
his doorway, after much watching, and shoots 
like a minnow across the moss to an up- 
turned root. There he sits up and listens, 
rubbing his whiskers nervously. Then he 
glides along the root for a couple of feet, 
drops to the ground and disappears. He is 
hiding there under a dead leaf. A moment 
of stillness and he jumps like Jack-in-a-box. 
Now he is sitting on the leaf that covered 
him, rubbing his whiskers again, looking 
back over his trail as if he heard footsteps 
behind him. Then another nervous dash, a 



309 



squeak which proclaims at once his escape 

and his arrival, and he vanishes under the 

old moss-grown log where his fellows live, a Todkhees 

whole colony of them. Wi^ . . 

All these things, and many more, I dis- 
covered the first season that I began to 
study the wild things that lived within sight 
of my tent. I had been making long excur- 
sions after bear and beaver, following on 
wild-goose chases after old Whitehead the 
eagle and Kakagos the wild woods raven, 
only to find that within the warm circle of 
my camp-fire little wild folk were hiding, 
whose lives were more unknown and quite 
as interesting as the greater creatures I had 
been following. 

One day, as I returned quietly to camp, I 
saw Simmo quite lost in watching something 
near my tent. He stood beside a great birch 
tree, one hand resting against the bark that 
he would claim next winter for his new 
canoe ; the other hand still grasped his axe, 
which he had picked up a moment before, to 
quicken the tempo of the bean kettle's song. 
His dark face peered behind the tree with 



310 




a kind of childlike intensity written all 
over it. 
TooT^ees I stole nearer without his hearing me ; but 
IF V//7 ^ ^ could see nothing. The woods were all 
still. Killooleet was dozing by his nest ; the 
chickadees had vanished, knowing that it 
was not meal time; and Meeko the red 
squirrel had been made to jump from the fir 
top to the ground so often that now he kept 
sullenly to his own hemlock, nursing his 
sore feet and scolding like a fury whenever 
I approached. Still Simmo watched, as if a 
bear were approaching his bait, till I whis- 
pered, " Quiee, Simmo, what is it ? " 

" Nodwar k'chee Toqttis, I see little 'Fraid 
One," he said, unconsciously dropping into 
his own dialect, which is the softest speech 
in the world, so soft that wild things are not 
disturbed when they hear it, thinking it only 
a louder sough of the pines or a softer tunk- 
ing of ripples on the rocks. — - " O bah cosh, 
see ! He wash-Um face in yo lil cup." And 
when I tiptoed to his side, there was Took- 
hees sitting on the rim of my drinking cup, 
in which I had left a new leader to soak for 




There was Tookhees sitting on the rim of my drinking cup 



311 



me 

Traid One 



the evening's fishing, scrubbing his face diH- 

gently. He would scoop up a double handful 

of water, rub it rapidly up over nose and eyes Too7<7}ees 

and then behind his ears, — on the spots that 

wake you up quickest when you are sleepy. 

Then another scoop of water, and another 

vigorous rub, ending behind his ears as before. 

Simmo was full of wonder; for an Indian 
notices few things in the woods beside those 
that pertain to his trapping and hunting; 
and to see a mouse wash his face was as 
incomprehensible to him as to see me read a 
book. But all wood mice are very cleanly; 
they have none of the strong odors of our 
house mice. Afterwards, while getting 
acquainted, I saw him wash many times in 
the plate of water that I kept filled near his 
den ; but he never washed more than his 
face and the sensitive spot behind his ears. 
Sometimes, however, when I have seen him 
swimming in the lake or river, I have won- 
dered whether he were going on a journey, 
or just bathing for the love of it, as he 
washed his face in my cup. 

I left the cup where it was and spread a 




feast for the little s^uest, cracker crumbs and 
312 . ^ 

a bit of candle end. In the morning they 
Tool{fiees were gone ; the signs of several mice telling 
rp. ^ Jp^ plainly who had been called in from the 
wilderness byways. That was the introduc- 
tion of man to beast. Soon they came regu- 
larly. I had only to scatter crumbs and 
squeak like a mouse, when little streaks and 
flashes would appear on the moss or among 
the faded gold tapestries of old birch leaves, 
and the little wild things would come to my 
table, their eyes shining like jet, their tiny 
paws lifted to rub their whiskers or to shield 
themselves from the fear under which they 
lived continually. 

They were not all alike ; quite the con- 
trary. One, the same that had washed in my 
cup, was gray and old, and wise from much 
dodging of enemies. His left ear was split, 
from a fight, or an owl's claw that just 
missed him as he dodged under a root. He 
was at once the shyest and boldest of the 
lot. For a day or two he came with mar- 
velous stealth, making use of every dead leaf 
and root tangle to hide his approach, and 



shooting across the open spaces so quickly 
that one knew not what had happened — 
just a dun streak which ended in nothing. TookTiees 
And the brown leaf gave no sign of what it Tp^ • # ^^ ^ 
sheltered. But once assured of his ground, 
he came boldly. This great man-creature, 
with his face close to the mouse table, per- 
fectly still but for his eyes, with a hand that 
moved gently if it moved at all, was not to 
be feared — that Tookhees felt instinctively. 
And this strange fire with hungry odors, and 
the white tent, and the comings and goings 
of men, who were masters of the woods, kept 
fox and lynx and owl far away — that he 
learned after a day or two. Only the mink, 
who crept in at night to steal the man's fish, 
was to be feared. So Tookhees presently 
gave up his nocturnal habits and came out 
boldly into the sunlight. Ordinarily the 
little creatures come out in the dusk, when 
their quick movements are hidden among 
the shadows that creep and quiver. But 
with fear gone, they are only too glad to run 
about in the daylight, especially when good 
things to eat are calling them. 




314 




Besides the veteran, there was a httle 

mother mouse, whose tiny gray jacket was 

TodJ{hees still big enough to cover a wonderful mother- 

J-. r> Jp^ love, as I afterwards found out. She never 
Fraid One ,, , i i r 

ate at my table, but carried her fare away 

into hiding, not to feed her little ones — they 
were too small as yet — but thinking in some 
dumb way, behind the bright little eyes, that 
they needed her, and that her life must 
be spared with greater precaution for their 
sakes. She would steal timidly to my table, 
always appearing from under a gray shred of 
bark on a fallen birch, following the same 
path, first to a mossy stone, then to a dark 
hole under a root, then to a low brake, and 
along the underside of a billet of wood to the 
mouse table. There she would stuff both 
cheeks hurriedly, until they bulged as if she 
had toothache, and steal away by the same 
path, disappearing at last under the shred of 
gray bark. 

For a long time it puzzled me to find her 
nest, which I knew could not be .far away. 
It was not in the birch log where she 
disappeared — that was hollow the whole 



length — nor was it anywhere beneath it. 
Some distance away was a large stone, half 
covered by the green moss which reached up TookTiees 



315 



from every side. The most careful search 5?^ . , ^ 

1 1 r 1 1 ^^ r fraid One 

here had tailed to discover any trace of 

Tookhees' doorway; so one day, when the 
wind blew half a gale and I was going out 
on the lake alone, I picked up this stone to 
put in the bow of my canoe. Then the 
secret was out, and there it was in a little 
dome of dried grass among some spruce 
roots, under the stone. 

The mother was away foraging, but a faint 
sibilant squeaking told me that the little 
ones were at home and hungry, as usual. 
As I watched there was a swift movement 
in a tunnel among the roots, and Mother 
Mouse came rushing back. She paused a 
moment, lifting her forepaws against a root 
to sniff what danger threatened. Then she 
saw my face bending over the opening — 
Et tu Brute ! and she darted into the nest. 
In a moment she was out again and disap- 
peared into her tunnel, running swiftly, with 
her little ones hanging to her sides — all but 




. one, a delicate pink creature that one could 
hide in a thimble. He had lost his grip and 
TooT^Iiees was left behind; but he soon found the 
F~^W^ n^ darkest corner of my hand and snuggled 
down there confidently. 

It was ten minutes before the little mother 
came back, looking anxiously for the lost 
baby. When she found him safe in his own 
nest, with the man's face still watching, she 
was half reassured; but when she threw her- 
self down and the little one began to drink, 
she grew fearful again and ran away into the 
tunnel, the little one clinging to her side, 
this time securely. 

I put the stone back and gathered the 
moss carefully about it. In a few days 
Mother Mouse was again at my table. I 
stole away to the stone, put my ear close to 
it, and heard with immense satisfaction tiny 
squeaks, which told me that the house was 
again occupied. Then I watched to find the 
path by which Mother Mouse came to her 
own. When her cheeks were full, she dis- 
appeared under the shred of bark by her 
usual route. That led into the hollow 



center of the birch log, which she followed 
to the end, where she paused a moment, eyes, 
ears, and' nostrils busy ; then she jumped to TodkTiees 



a tanorle of roots and dead leaves, beneath lOi^ ., ^ 
11 11 111 1 /r^/o^ One 

which was a tunnel that led, deep down 

under the moss, straight to her nest beneath 
the stone. 

Besides these older mice, there were five 
or six smaller ones, all shy save one, who 
from the first showed not the slightest fear 
but came straight to my hand, ate his crumbs, 
and went up my sleeve, where he proceeded 
to make himself a warm nest by nibbling 
wool from my flannel shirt. 

In strong contrast to this little fellow |/ ^\ 
was another, who knew too well what fear "*( | 




meant. He belonged to another tribe, that ^^^i^^/^^y 

had not yet grown accustomed to man's 

ways. I learned too late how careful one 

must be in handling the little creatures 

that live continually in the land where fear 

reigns. 

A little way behind my tent was a fallen 
log, mouldy and moss-grown, with twin- 
flowers shaking their bells along its length, 




^ under which Hved a whole colony of wood 
mice. They ate the crumbs that I placed 
TooT^liees by the log ; but they could never be tolled to 
Frafrf On "^^ table, whether because they had no split- 
eared old veteran to spy out the man's ways, 
or because my own colony drove them away, 
I could never find out. One day I saw 
Tookhees dive under the big log as I ap- 
proached, and having nothing more impor- 
tant to do, I placed one big crumb near his 
entrance, stretched out in the moss, hid my 
hand in a dead brake near the tempting 
morsel, and squeaked the call. In a moment 
Tookhees' nose and eyes appeared in his 
doorway, his whiskers twitching nervously as 
he smelled the candle grease. But he was 
suspicious of the big object, or perhaps he 
smelled the man and was afraid, for after 
much dodging in and out he disappeared 
altogether. 

I was wondering how long his hunger 
would battle with his caution, when I saw 
the moss near my bait stir from beneath. A 
little waving of the moss blossoms, and 
Tookhees' nose and eyes appeared out of the 



ground for an instant, sniffing in all direc- 
tions. His little scheme was evident enough 
now; he was tunneling for the morsel that 
he dared not take openly. I watched with 
breathless interest as a faint quiver, nearer 
my bait, showed where he was pushing his 
works. Then the moss stirred cautiously 
close beside his objective; a hole opened; 
the morsel tumbled in, and Tookhees was 
gone with his prize. 

I placed more crumbs from my pocket in 
the same place, and presently three or four 
mice were nibbling them. One sat up close 
by the dead brake, holding a bit of bread in 
his fore paws, like a squirrel. The brake 
stirred suddenly; before he could jump my 
hand closed over him. Slipping the other 
hand beneath him, I held him up to my face 
to watch him between my fingers. He made 
no movement to escape, but trembled vio- 
lently. His legs seemed too weak to sup- 
port his weight; he lay down; his eyes 
closed. One convulsive twitch and he was 
dead — dead of fright in a hand which had 
not harmed him. 



319 

Todkliees 

ifie 

Fraid One 



320 



^ Fraid One 



It was at this colony, whose members were 
all strangers to me, that I learned in a pecu- 
Too7{hees liar way of the visiting habits of wood mice, 
and at the same time another lesson that I 
shall not soon forget. For several days I 
had been trying every legitimate way in vain 
to catch a big trout, a monster of his kind, 
that lived in an eddy behind a rock, up at 
the inlet. Trout were scarce in that lake ; 
and in summer the big fish are always lazy 
and hard to catch. I was trout hungry most 
of the time, for the fish that I caught were 
small, and few and far between. Several 
times, however, when casting from the shore 
at the inlet for small fish, I had seen swirls 
in a great eddy near the farther shore, which 
told me plainly of big fish beneath ; and one 
day, when a huge trout rolled half his length 
out of water behind my fly, small fry lost all 
their interest and I promised myself the joy 
of feeling my rod bend and tingle beneath 
the rush of that big trout if it took all 
summer. 

Flies were of no use. I offered him a book- 
ful, every variety of shape and color, at dawn 



and dusk, without tempting him. I tried 
grubs, which bass hke, and a frog's leg, which 
no pickerel can resist, and little frogs, such TodkTiees 
as big trout hunt among the lily pads in the fp^jd^^ 
twilight, — all without pleasing him. And 
then w^ater-beetles, and a red squirrel's tail- 
tip, which makes the best hackle in the 
world, and kicking grasshoppers, and a sil- 
ver spoon with a wicked "gang" of hooks, 
which I detest and which, I am thankful to 
remember, the trout detested also. They 
lay there in their big cool eddy, lazily taking 
what food the stream brought down to them, 
giving no heed to frauds of any kind. 

Then I caught a red-fin in the stream 
above, hooked it securely, laid it on a big 
chip, coiled my line upon it, and set it float- 
ing down stream, the line uncoiling gently 
behind it as it went. When it reached the 
eddy I raised my rod tip ; the line straight- 
ened; the red-fin plunged overboard, and a 
two-pound trout, thinking, no doubt, that 
the little fellow^ had been hiding under the 
chip, rose for him and took him in. That 
was the only one I caught. His struggle 



322 




disturbed the pool, and the other trout gave 
no heed to more red-fins. 
TooT{hees Then, one morning at daybreak, as I sat 
^ >/ /7 ^ on a big rock pondering new baits and 
devices, a stir on an alder bush across the 
stream caught my eye. Tookhees the wood 
mouse was there, running over the bush, 
evidently for the black catkins which still 
clung to the tips. As I watched him he 
fell, or jumped from his branch into the 
quiet water below and, after circling about 
for a moment, headed bravely across the 
current. I could just see his nose as he 
swam, a rippling wedge against the black 
water, with a widening letter V trailing out 
behind him. The current swept him down- 
ward ; he touched the edge of the big eddy ; 
there was a swirl, a mighty plunge beneath, 
and Tookhees was gone, leaving no trace but 
a swift circle of ripples that were swallowed 
up in the rings and dimples behind the 
rock. — I had found what bait the big trout 
wanted. 

Hurrying back to camp, I loaded a car- 
tridge lightly with a pinch of dust shot, 



ifie 
Traid One 



spread some crumbs near the big log behind 
my tent, squeaked the call a few times, and 
sat down to wait. " These mice are strangers TookTiees 
to me," I told Conscience, who was protest- 
ing a little, " and the woods are full of them, 
and I want that trout." 

In a moment there was a rustle in the 
mossy doorway and Tookhees appeared. 
He darted across the open, seized a crumb 
in his mouth, sat up on his hind legs, took 
the crumb in his paws, and began to eat. I 
had raised the gun, thinking he would dodge 
back a few times before giving me a shot; 
his boldness surprised me, but I did not 
recognize him. Still my eye followed along 
the barrels and over the sight to where 
Tookhees sat eating his crumb. My finger 
was pressing the trigger — " O you big 
butcher," said Conscience, " think how little 
he is, and w^hat a big roar your gun will 
make ! Are n't you ashamed } " 

" But I want the trout," I protested. 

" Catch him then, without killing this lit- 
tle harmless thing," said Conscience sternly. 

" But he is a stranger to me ; I never " — 




324 
lees 



" He is eating your bread and salt," said 
Conscience. That settled it; but even as I 
TodJ^ees looked at him over the gun sight, Tookhees 
^"y^'^~>/ /7 ^ finished his crumb, came to my foot, ran 
along my leg into my lap, and looked into 
my face expectantly. The grizzled coat and 
the split ear showed the welcome guest at 
my table for a week past. He was visiting 
the stranger colony, as wood mice are fond 
of doing, and persuading them by his exam- 
ple that they might trust me, as he did. 
More ashamed than if I had been caught 
potting quail, I threw away the hateful 
shell that had almost slain my friend, and 
went back to camp. 

There I made a mouse of a bit of muskrat 
fur, with a piece of my leather shoestring 
sewed on for a tail. It served the purpose 
perfectly, for within the hour I was admiring 
the size and beauty of the big trout as he 
stretched his length on the rock beside me. 
But I lost the fraud at the next cast, leaving 
it, with a foot of my leader, in the mouth of 
a second trout that rolled up at it the instant 
it touched his eddy behind the rock. 



After that the wood mice were safe, so far 

325 
as I was concerned. Not a trout, though he 

were big as a salmon, would ever taste them, Tookfiees 

unless they chose to 2:0 swimminQ- of their J/^ . ,^7^^ 

1 1 T 1 1 f T 1 ^^^'d One 

own accord ; and 1 kept then* table better 

supplied than before. I saw much of their 
visiting back and forth, and have understood 
better what those tunnels mean that one 
finds in the spring when the last snows are 
melting. In a corner of the woods, where 
the drifts lay, you will often find a score of 
tunnels coming in from all directions to a 
central chamber. They speak of Tookhees' 
sociable nature, of his long visits with his 
fellows, undisturbed by swoop or snap, when 
the packed snow above has swept the sum- 
mer fear away and made him safe from hawk 
and owl and fox and wildcat, and when no 
open water tempts him to go swimming, 
where Skooktum the big trout lies waiting 
mouse hungry, under his eddy. 

The weeks passed all too quickly, as 
wilderness weeks do, and the sad task of 
breaking camp lay just before us. But one 




Fraid One 



thing troubled me — the little Tookhees, 
who knew no fear, but tried to make a nest 
in the sleeve of my flannel shirt. His sim- 
ple confidence touched me more than the 
curious ways of all the other mice. Every 
day he came and took his crumbs, not from 
the common table, but from my hand, evi- 
dently enjoying its warmth while he ate, and 
always getting the choicest morsels. But I 
knew that he would be the first one caught 
by the owl after I left ; for it is fear only 
that saves the wild things. 

Occasionally one finds animals of various 
kinds in which the instinct of fear is lacking 
— a frog, a young partridge, a moose calf — 
and wonders what golden age that knew no 
fear, or what glorious vision of Isaiah, in 
which lion and lamb lie down together, is 
here set forth. I have even seen a young 
black duck, whose natural disposition is wild 
as the wilderness itself, that had profited 
nothing by his mother's alarms and her con- 
stant lessons in hiding, but came bobbing up 
to my canoe among the sedges of a wilder- 
ness lake, while his brethren crouched 



327 



invisible in their coverts of bending rushes, 

and his mother flapped wildly off, splashing 

and quacking and trailing a wing, to draw TodkTiees 

me away from the little ones. Traid^O^ 

The little one that knows no fear is gen- 
erally abandoned by his mother, or else is 
the first to fall in the battle with the strong 
before she gives him up as hopeless. Little 
Tookhees evidently belonged to this class; 
so, before leaving, I undertook the task of 
teaching him fear, which had evidently been 
too much for Nature and his own mother. 
I pinched him a few times, hooting like an 
owl as I did so, — a startling process, which 
sent the other mice diving like brown streaks 
to cover. Then I waved a branch over him, 
like a hawk's wing, at the same time flipping 
him end over end, shaking him up terribly. 
Then again, when he appeared with a new 
light dawning in his eyes, the light of fear, I 
would set a stick to wiggling, like a creep- 
ing fox, among the ferns, and switch him 
sharply with a hemlock tip. It was a hard 
lesson, but he learned it after a few days. 
And before I finished the teaching not a 





mouse would come to my table, no matter 
how persuasively I squeaked. They would 
dart about in the twilis^ht, as of yore, but 
Frafd Ch^p the first whish of my stick sent them all 
back to cover on the instant. 

That was their stern yet practical prepara- 
tion for the robber horde that would soon be 
prowling over my camping ground. Then 
a stealthy movement among the ferns, or 
the sweep of a shadow among the twilight 
shadows would mean a very different thing 
from wriggling stick and waving hemlock 
tip. Snap and swoop, and teeth and claws, 
— jump for your life and find out afterwards. 
That is the rule for a wise wood mouse. So 
I said good-by, and left them to take care of 
themselves in the wilderness. 



.^, 







GLOSSARY OF INDIAN NAMES 

Cheokhes, che-ok-hes', the mink. 
Ch'geegee-lokh, cK' gee-gee' -lock ^ the chickadee. 
Cheplahgan, chep-ldh'-gan^ the bald eagle. 
Chigwooltz, chig-wooltz\ the bullfrog. 
Cldte Scarpe, a legendary hero, like Hiawatha, 

of the Northern Indians. Pronounced variously, Clote 

Scarpe, Groscap, Gluscap, etc. 
Deedeeaskh, dee-dee' -ask ^ the blue jay. 
Hukweem, huk-weem', the great northern diver, or loon. 
Ismaques, iss-md-ques", the fish-hawk. 
Kagax, kdg'-dx, the weasel. 
Kakagos, kd-kd-gos', the raven. 
Keeokuskh, kee-o-kusk' ^ the muskrat. 
Keeonekh, kee'-o-nek, the otter. 
Killooleet, kil'-loo-leef^ the white-throated sparrow. 
Kookooskoos, koo-koo-skoos', the great horned owl. 
Koskomenos, kos'-kom-e-nos' ^ the kingfisher. 
Kupkawis, cup-kqf-wis^ the barred owl. 
Kwaseekho, kwd-seek'-ho, the sheldrake. 
Lhoks, locks, the panther. 
Malsun, ?ndl'-sun, the wolf. 
Meeko, ineek'-o, the red squirrel. 
Megaleep, meg'-d-leep, the caribou. 
331 




Milicete, inil'-i-cete^ the name of an Indian tribe; written 

also Malicete. 
Mitches, mit-ches^ the birch partridge, or ruffed grouse. 
Moktaques, 7nok-td'-ques, the hare. 
Mooween, moo-ween' ^ the black bear. 
Musquash, ?nus' -qiidsh^ the muskrat. 
Nemox, nem'-ox^ the fisher. 
Pekquam, pek-ivd77i\ the fisher. 
Seksagadagee, sek'-sd-ga-dd'-gee^ the Canada grouse, or spruce 

partridge. 
Skooktum, skook'-tmn, the trout. 
Tookhees, tok'-hees, the wood mouse. 
Upweekis, up-week'-iss^ the Canada lynx. 



I 



^fOV ii torn 



OCT 10 1901 



